


One Hell Of a Soul Mark

by scratches



Series: Soul Mates [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Art Theft, BAMF Darcy Lewis, Brock's jeep, Darcy loves music, F/M, Jane has the Hammer, Jane is Thor, Jane is in SPACE, Lady Thor, Magic cannoli, Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Original Male Characters - Freeform, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, SHIELD Agent Darcy Lewis, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, a rotating cast of characters, all the rumlows, brock loves metal, concealed carry, darcy is secretly a bad ass, finally a date, gangsta rap wednesdays, helen cho's cradle, jewel thief, otp, pour some sugar on me, ride or die - Freeform, triple agent Brock, triple agent jack, water aerobics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:27:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 25,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23996725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scratches/pseuds/scratches
Summary: Darcy had so many false positives to her soulmark that by the time she hit eighteen she had given up on ever finding her match. How many people were going to ask herWhat are you listening to?throughout her life. She stopped counting at one hundred and three, she was sixteen.Brock wasn't a selfish soulmate, he made a promise to himself as a young man that no matter who his soulmate was, they would know every time he was sent on a mission, even though they marked him withHuff My Sack.
Relationships: Darcy Lewis/Brock Rumlow
Series: Soul Mates [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2081313
Comments: 401
Kudos: 633





	1. Soul Mates?

**Author's Note:**

> We are taking a break from our regular scheduled smut to enjoy a rambling silly soulmark story.

Darcy had so many false positives to her soulmark that by the time she hit eighteen she had given up on ever finding her match. How many people were going to ask her _What are you listening to?_ throughout her life. She stopped counting at one hundred and three, she was sixteen.

Working with SHIELD meant that she had interactions with hundreds of different people all day, everyday. A political analyst to assess SHIELD's approval rating meant she spoke with everyone, whether it be internal or external. 

The good thing about her job, she figured, was that while she was in her cubicle she was able to tune the whole building out. Her direct supervisors didn't mind her drowning them out with earbuds in her ears. 

Darcy nodded her head to the loud music coming from her earbuds as she wrote a report on the possible political struggles they were going to have if they were to deal with the rebel uprising in Bangladesh. It didn't look good. A shadow loomed over her before Darcy moved her eyes from the screen to assess the person standing there. 

Her brows rose. Commander Rumlow, newly reinstated STRIKE ALPHA Commander, was standing over her as he cringed and looked visibly pained. He mimed taking out an earbud with his hands. Darcy pulled out her right bud. _"What are you listening to?"_

She rolled her eyes, not again. " _Huff My Sack_." She sighed before she put the earbud back in and went back to writing her assessment. Rumlow tapped her on her shoulder. With an agitated sigh, Darcy turned and pulled the music from her ears again. "What do you want, dude? The report will be ready for the briefing tomorrow."

Commander Rumlow stood over her in black on black pants and a SHIELD issued tight tactical undershirt. "Can you turn it down?" He arched a brow. "Delahany is temporarily assigned to the space next to you and can't work with the...what ever you think passes as music."

"And he couldn't ask me?" She reached to her keyboard and pushed the volume down. Screeching guitars and blast beats lowered until they were almost silent.

Rumlow reached out and touched the leaf of one of her pothos plants. "He didn't want to interrupt your creative genius."

"As lovely of a lie that that is, I can comply for now." Darcy leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. "Does he have any requests? Sex Pistols? The Ramones? Lightning Bolt? Who Killed Spikey Jacket? Fridays are punk days." 

He flicked the leaf and leveled his gaze back to her. "He's here for a few weeks, just attempt at civility, please."

"You're not the boss of me, Commander."

He smirked. "Honey, I'm third in the chain of command here. I'm almost everyone's boss." 

"Delahany needs to man the fuck up." She turned back to her computer. "Good talk."

"Don't be a smart ass, Lewis."

She side eyed him. "If you want this report for tomorrow, Commander, I politely ask you to skedaddle so me and my creative genius can get back to this PR shitshow."

Rumlow rolled his eyes before he turned away from her desk and moved to the cubicle that Delahany was using. "Ugh." She sighed before she focused back on her computer.

~~

Putting in her four hours a week at the gym was not something Darcy ever thought she would look forward to. Thankfully, when she was recruited, she only had to attempt the adjunct training. Darcy hadn't been in the classes that required self defence training. She had a tough enough time balancing during Downward Facing Dog. 

SHIELD had a lovely water aerobics teacher who taught three times a week, and no one ever judged Darcy and her strawberry printed swim cap. Darcy had found her physical readiness class of choice within it. She had also made friends, since the only person she knew when she moved here was Clint Barton.

Midori, a tall dark woman from Logistics, stood behind her as Darcy stripped out of her suit. "Oh shit. Have you looked in the mirror lately?" Midori said.

Darcy was bent over, her suit at her ankles, bare ass on display. She blinked up at Midori who had a towel around her neck, her own naked body frozen. "What? I look in the mirror everyday, you don't get cat eyes like mine if you don't." Darcy grabbed her suit before she walked to the machine that helped dry it.

"But when was the last time you looked at your.. your soulmark?" Midori pointed at it.

Darcy rolled her eyes and held the lid to the machine closed. "I am not flexible enough to look at that part of my ass by myself."

Her friend grabbed the mirror out of her locker and pulled Darcy to the full length near the showers. "It was black on Wednesday. I see your ass three times a week, girl."

"Holy shit." Darcy held the mirror next to her ass and looked into it. Her soulmark had finally changed. The severe black penmanship had turned a mossy green. "Holy shit."

"So who's the lucky person?" Midori raised a dark brow.

Darcy's eyes were wide. "I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?" Midori put her hands on her hips. "How do you not know?"

"I get asked this like twelve times a week." Darcy _had_ been asked many times since Wednesday's class. There was Boris from Finance, Cameron (Not Klein, female) from the observatory, Commander Rumlow, and Desiree from HR.

"And no one said anything?" 

"Not a one." Darcy handed the mirror back. "I mean, I try to listen to the most obscure stuff so their mark stands out, you know?"

"Well, maybe their mark is on an unreadable part of their ass too." Midori sighed and walked towards the shower block with Darcy behind her. 

"Maybe." Darcy pulled a plush towel from the stack and slipped into the shower.

~~

Brock pulled his shirt up and looked at his left latissimus dorsi in the mirror. _Huff My Sack_ was in bright blue spidery lettering, a stark contrast to the black tattoos across his body. "Fuck." He muttered before he moved to his gym bag. What was he going to do? She was younger than him, a lot younger. Darcy Lewis had multiple master's degrees. If he recalled from her file: Political Science, Global Politics, Norse Mythology, and was working on her Master's in Homeland Security at George Washington University. She had co-wrote groundbreaking scientific papers with Dr. Jane Foster. What exactly would they have in common? Drinking margaritas at Pepe Loco's on wacky Wednesday? He'd seen her there before with Cameron Klein and Sharon Carter when she visited from Germany.

"Fuck." Brock pulled his shirt back down over his body before slamming his locker shut. 

"Everything alright?" Jack Rollins asked as he peeked his head out from the shower block. 

"No, but I can handle it." He zipped his gym bag up and threw it over his shoulder.

"You sure? Looking kind of cagey over there." Jack wrapped a towel around his thin waist before he stood near Brock.

"I can handle it Jack." Brock stated. "It's nothing."

"I don't believe you, but whatever you say, boss." Jack popped his locker and pulled out a pair of clean clothes.

~~

"I don't want to be buried in a pet cemetary!" Darcy sang along with her music as she exited the gym locker room. She adjusted her messenger bag before she walked into a solid body exiting the men's locker room. "Whoops." She looked up and saw the cool eyes and clenched jaw of Commander Rumlow. "Sorry, dude."

Darcy attempted to step to the side but he also tried at the same time. "It's not a problem." Darcy stepped again, so did Rumlow.

"Alright," she pulled one side of her earbuds out, "you stand here." She reached up and held his shoulders in place.

"What." She felt him stiffen under her touch. 

"Stand there for a second." Darcy smiled before she moved to the right and around him. "Thanks, Commander."

"Really?" Darcy caught him as he looked over his shoulder with an exasperated expression.

"What?" She smiled, flipped her dark curly hair over her shoulder and made her way down the corridor.


	2. Bargaining

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bargain for gangsta rap Wednesday is made

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first: I want to thank everyone for the fantastic reviews and the (overwhelming amount) of kudos this has received.   
> second: who would have thought not writing dirty fics would gain more readers.  
> third: i really hope you enjoy this chapter and I'll update the next in a few days!

Brock stood at her desk again. Delahany had called down to him to intervene with Lewis. Evidently she was playing Eazy-E and the cussing was making him twitch. Brock was a Catholic boy, but he knew when to pick his battles. Maybe it could have been chalked up to him being in his early twenties when Eazy-E was making headlines that made him amiable to her listening to the rap at that decibel. Shit, Brock remembered when Eazy-E came out to say that he had HIV and how he died a month later. He stood there, hand holding the grey wall as the rap flew tinnily around the cubicle. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a neat twisted bun and her head bopped to the beat for a song he hadn't heard since 1992.

"He can fuck right off, Commander." Darcy said as she clacked across her keyboard. The young woman didn't look up from the document she was working on to look at him, not many people had the balls to ignore the STRIKE ALPHA Commander. Her ear buds were neatly wedged in her ears and Brock was impressed that she could listen to the music that loud. "It's gangsta rap Wednesday, it's been gangsta rap Wednesday for three years, it will continue to be gangsta rap Wednesday until I'm fired from this hell hole I have found myself in."

He reached down and tugged at one of the white earbuds until it fell from her ear. Brock was lucky she only gave him a side eye, her blue eyes narrowed, and eye liner crinkled. "He's a delicate little flower, just turn it down, please."

"Aw baby STRIKE agent can't handle NWA. Wait until I start playing Geto Boys,” her voice dropped into the pitch people used to speak to babies with, “Do you think he'll leave the room crying? Or will it take Gravediggaz for him to leave?" Darcy continues on with her document, lines of text spilling across the double screen on her desk. Brock briefly sees the words: _Syria_ , _unintentional bombing_ , and _uncountable casualties_ on the screen. Yeah..this might be a fight Delahany will lose. And now, Brock really wasn’t looking forward to the briefing that was most likely coming from this analysis. She turned and stared at him, her blue eyes cool and unblinking. "And where exactly have you been for the last hundred fifty gangsta rap Wednesdays, Commander?" 

Brock picked at her variegated pothos again, it’s large leaves waxy under his fingers. Why the fuck shouldn’t he be honest, it’s not like everyone else didn’t know, maybe she was playing him and wanted to hear it from his lips. "I was buried under a building, burned myself to hell, kept my good hair and wit. Then I stole a two and a half billion dollars worth of SHIELD equipment back for Fury before I faked my own death at the hands of Captain America, and a bunch of Avengers, after getting a vial that The Ten Rings was going to use as a biological weapon into Natasha’s hands. Finally, I had to undergo cryogenic freezing to heal the burns on eighty percent of my body." He motioned to the injured ear that Darcy hadn't eyed in the few interactions they had, "Only reminder I have left from that life."

She laughed so hard she started to snort, her shoulders shaking. "Yeah, pull my other leg."

"No, really," he bowed dramatically, "Crossbones at your service."

She turned quickly and prodded his muscular stomach with a pointed black nail. "You were the bane of my fucking existence for two years, Commander." Her eyes narrowed. "You're the reason gangsta rap Wednesday was created.” Darcy used her non-poking finger to gesture in Delahany’s general direction, “So tell your little nerd too bad, so sad. He should have done his CBRNE, HIPPA, Cyber Security, Weapons Readiness and his other six online training courses on time. And,” she leaned forward and pushed her finger harder into his stomach, “maybe someone should take his internet access away so he can focus on his work and not search for hamburger telephones on eBay or play Bubble Blaster on the emulator he downloaded."

Brock pushed her pointy nail off of his soft black shirt and ignored the fact that she knew so much about his subordinate and the fact that he was slacking off on the job. "He's in this office for another week or two."

"Are you just trying to keep him out of your hair while the Congressional Committee does their walk through?" Her chair creaked as she sat back to assess him.

His eyes met Darcy's and his lips pursed. "You shouldn't even know they are coming, that's above your pay grade."

"Can't help it if people think that the information might be imperative to my job and the deadlines I'm under." She did a fake cough that sounded like _Maria Hill_. “Unlike ya boy over there, people think that I do a great job...even though I hate it.” Darcy paused, “Call un-dead Coulson if you really have an issue with my security clearance level, he thinks I go above and beyond to make sure that the teams have been properly briefed about international, and interstellar, threats while they are deployed.”

Shaking his head, Brock ran a hand through his cropped hair and asked with a sigh, "Can't you play nice until I have to take him back?"

As she rocked her chair it continued to creak under her. Her bright lips turned into a feral grin as she asked, "What's in it for me if I acquiesce and play nice with your little snowflake?" 

Brock leaned against the cubicle wall and crossed his arms thinking. He watched as she looked him down and then back up slowly. Her eyes spent a moment too long assessing his thighs and shoulders. A smile graced her lips as their eyes met. "Are you going to drive a hard bargain if I let you choose?" 

"Everything has a price, Commander." Darcy's bright lips curled into a smirk.

"And what exactly is the price for gangsta rap Wednesday?" 

"You really want to know?" Darcy rocked further back in her chair, tapping her pointed nails on the arms. 

"I'm curious to know what you think it's worth." Brock reached out to flick at a Queen Elizabeth and Corgi bobblehead next to her plant.

She beckoned him forward with a crooked finger. What was he to do other than follow it at this point? "You really want to know what it's worth?" Her voice pitched low to a whisper. Brock met her eyes and crooked a brow. Darcy moved closer to his burned ear and slowly said, "Well, soulmate, how about you show me yours and I'll behave."

Brock moved back and regarded her. Darcy's smirk pulled at her lips while black fingernails tapped on her knees. Darcy waited for a response. They both stared at each other until it became an awkward silence, other people’s typing and echoing music could be heard around them . "I'll see you in my office after work then." He nodded, forfeiting to her.

"Seven," she insisted, "I have water aerobics tonight." Darcy smiled and turned back to her monitor, like he had never walked into her area to begin with. 

Brock moved until he held her chair by it's leather back and leaned down to her ear and whispered, "Lower the music until then." 

"Sure, sure. Now, get out of my office, Commander."

"It's a cubicle." He said airily before turning to address Delahany for wasting his time and being a delicate flower. And to take his access to the internet away, all the information he needed for the training was in the hours long videos. Brock might suggest that he take notes in a spiral notebook.

~~

"You what?" Midori asked as Darcy pulled a purple thong up her legs and over her ass. 

"I did the process of elimination." Darcy then tugged her black pencil skirt up to her waist and smoothed it out. "It was science." She laughed.

"You went to everyone and bluntly asked them, didn't you?" Midori sighed and pulled a black shirt with the SHIELD logo over her body. She shook her head, braids swishing across her back.

"It was only five people. It's not like I asked the whole building." Darcy pulled the straps to her matching bra up her shoulders before slipping her sleeveless shirt on and buttoning the orange silk. Darcy had rotated this shirt into her wardrobe when the season had changed. Autumn was a good season for rusty colors and she had a dress code for herself, silk shirts were to be worn on gangsta rap Wednesday's only. 

Her friend sounded speechless, "I don't know how you haven't been fired yet."

Darcy laughed, "Right? I don't either, I've tried everything except sexual harassment, killing someone...or espionage, I'm not cut out for that kind of stuff, it's messy and I'm not keen on prison." She waved her hand dismissively.

Midori stared at her friend and stated, "Darcy, just get multiple DUIs like the rest of the good employees who get fired."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DUN DUN DUN


	3. Show me yours, I'll show you mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soulmarks are seen  
> Jack is the worst.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always thank you for the continued support, this fic has spiraled out of control. (especially chapter 9 woops)

Three quick knocks sounded at his door a few minutes before seven. He shuffled some paperwork to the side and said, "Come in."

The knob turned and the door rattled on its weak hinges as Darcy pushed her way in. "Commander." Her heel tapped the door closed behind her.

"Lewis." He nodded and motioned to the leather chairs in front of his desk.

Darcy strutted in, her heels quiet on the carpet. Folding her skirt under her, Darcy sat lightly and said, "Oh, it's like sitting on a butter cloud." Darcy’s arms caressed the soft leather after she sat. Her legs crossed at her ankles and she dropped her familiar messenger bag to the side.

"Hill dragged them out of storage for me." Brock capped his pen and put it in the desk drawer. 

"Wasn't that just nice of her." Darcy looked around his office. Brock was aware he had jammed a lot into it. He had a wardrobe on one side, a dark wooden file cabinet on the other, his father's coat rack had a black trilby hat on it. Behind his desk hung a two-ish foot by two-ish foot painting in a gilded frame: Claude Monet's _Beach in Pourville_. It brought a softness to the room as the paint reflected off the two sleek floor lamps. There's a framed photo of his family on his desk facing away from Darcy in a mosaic frame his mother had grouted with her broken china. Hydra had raided her decoy house after the uprising and flipped it looking for information on where he could have been. Thankfully Darcy didn't try to reach for it and turn it around, Brock held his family close and he would put the photo inside his desk before he let coworkers look at it. 

"Delahany is a pain in my fucking ass." He finally said after the silence dragged on into the awkward territory again. They were both great at sitting in awkward silences, dragging them out to see who would speak first. Brock leaned back in his leather office chair and shook his head. 

"Yeah," Darcy dragged the word out. She grimaced. "When he moved up to my floor I read his last evaluation from Commander Tanaka on Charlie. Woof. She didn't hold back for Commander Hill with what her recommendations for him were."

Brock watched her nails tap on the leather arms, he wondered if it was because she was comfortable or nervous. "Barton needs to get back from his farm or someone needs to recruit Barnes so I can demote this kid. His next evaluation isn't going to be much better. If he wasn't such a good shot, he'd be sitting at a desk doing ballistic forensics."

"Not near me though." Darcy guffawed and Brock smiled as all of her teeth showed. 

"You should be in an office with a view of the Potomac so you don't go off the rails like Aarron Hughes before you, and the fact that because he was slowly losing it, HYDRA was able to recruit him. It's the little things." Brock said seriously. "No one should be sitting near you, you need an office that can lock." 

"Oh?" She lifted a sculpted brow. "Is that so?"

Brock rolled his eyes. He walked into that innuendo. "Hughes' desk? He was down the hall from Fury with matching furniture and his own coffee maker. You work with highly sensitive information and any Joe Schmo could walk by you and get an eyeful of information they don't have the clearance for. "

"Good thing you've got the clearance," Darcy nodded at him. "You're the only one who has entered my domain without express permission in three years." 

"I'll claim soulmate privileges if anyone asks." Brock said simply.

"I'll believe it when I see it, Commander." She leaned forward and ran her tongue across her teeth before she asked, "So where is it? Chest? Thigh? Between your toes?" Darcy’s body wiggled playfully in her seat.

Brock paused. Was she being serious? "Between my toes?" 

Darcy shrugged. "I mean, you never know. I've thought a lot about where my soulmate's mark would be." She tapped her nails again.

"Do you really want to see?" Brock had gone through years of teasing and outright hazing, because of his soulmark. He couldn't imagine the kind of person who's first words to him were _Huff My Sack_.

Darcy scooted to the front of her chair and leaned forward. His eyes dipped to her chest. It was generous and flushed pink from the shower she most likely took after the aerobics class. His teeth bit his lip before he looked back up and looked at his soulmate. "I've had so many false positives I gave up on finding my soulmate fourteen years ago."

"Well, I'm pretty sure you've found him because no one in my life has ever uttered _Huff My Sack_ to me in any sort of conversation.” Brock rubbed his eyebrows and licked his dry lips again.

Darcy laughed and pointed. "Oh shit. Punk Fridays. Lumpy and the Dumpers." She made a fist and banged the arm of the chair. "Shit I'm sorry. Ha!" She had tears running down her face from laughing so hard. "So can I see it?" She managed to ask between laughs. “Fuck,” she snorted with more laughter.

Unabashedly, Brock stood and moved around the desk. He pulled his shirt up over his head and watched as her eyes widened behind her glasses. Brock wasn't stupid. He worked on his body like it was a piece of art. The knock-off HYDRA serum he had been injected with in 2008 only made it easier for his metabolism to pack muscle on instead of fat. He watched as she licked her own lips before he turned in front of her. "It's over here." Both of his hands made a general motion to the spot on his back that he could never actually reach. "You can..you can touch it if you want, too."

"That's. Wow. I'm sorry." She tried to hold back her laughs. "I am really, truly, sorry." Brock didn't see her reach out, only felt her cool nails tracing the letters. "It is even in my chicken scratch." His hazel eyes met hers as she looked up at him. "I didn't even know humans had muscles here." Darcy trailed her fingers across his back. "Day-um, Commander."

He moved a step away from her touch and turned. "It's Brock if we aren’t in a work setting." She nodded. “It’s weird when someone sees me at the grocers and calls me Commander.” He leaned against the edge of his desk with his legs stretched and arms bent. One of his hands held onto his shirt.

Darcy watched him silently before a devious look entered her eyes. "Do you want to see mine?" Why did half of the things out of her mouth sound like innuendos and why did he like it?

"Do I?" Brock cocked a brow. It felt like a trap.

"I think so, but you might want to take a seat." She stood from her chair as Brock sat in the other guest chair that was angled towards the middle of the room next to his wardrobe, there was a hand knitted blanket tossed across the back. "Are you sure, Brock?" Darcy's voice was low as she stepped closer to him, rolling his name slowly. 

They made eye contact again before he held onto the arms of his own chair. It was definitely a trap. He was in for one hell of a ride if she was his soulmate. Brock looked at her lips before he quietly said, "I'm sure." His mother always told him that seeing your writing on someone for the first time was something you'd never forget...and boy was she right.

She moved up close to him before she started to inch her skirt up. His hand reached out and held her hip as she caught her heel in the scratchy carpet. Darcy gave him a soft smile before she continued up. Her skirt hitched around her hips and she twisted so he could see the mark that started at the middle of her crack and angled to the bottom of her plump ass. The beginning of _What_ is hidden by the fabric of her thong. "Give a guy some warning, fuck." He muttered while he continued to look. Brock felt his breathing pick up and hands start to sweat as Darcy turned so he could view her mark better. His rigid, legible writing was stretched with a jaunty question mark at the end. "Can I?" 

Darcy nodded as they made eye contact again, it was more intense this time and her teeth bit one side of her lower lip. His large hand moved from her hip to trace his own letters. Brock didn’t know what else to say. Could he actually say anything? He’d waited fifty one years for this moment. Thirty two years ago when his own mark had shown up, he had been afraid that he would be meeting some teen as a thirty year old, but his mother had put his head on straight, the universe had a way to make things work. There had been eight between her and his father, his mother being the older of the two. 

Brock was at the _E_ of _listening_ when they both heard, "Hey boss, do you ha…...oops, never mind." Jack Rollins closed the door just as quickly as he opened it, the sharp hall light flickered into the room for a moment.

Brock dropped his hand like he was holding hot coals before Darcy smoothed her skirt back over her ass and looked down at him. "So are we a match?"

His hands moved to grab her hips but Brock double guessed himself and dropped them before he dared to touch her again. "Definitely a match." 

~~

"Can I cut in front of you, Commander?" Darcy smiled brightly as she moved next to the two kitted out STRIKE agents at the on site cafe.

She saw the sneak, Jack Rollins, smirk behind Brock and wiggle his eyebrows. "No." Brock said as he gave her an intense side eye. 

She let her jaw open to be mock affronted. "What, for real?" Darcy said before frowning. 

"For real, Lewis." His arms crossed across his chest and Darcy watched as his eyes dropped to the V-cut of her blouse. At least he wasn't trying to hide that he was looking, Darcy surmised happily.

She pouted before she asked, "What if I buy your coffee?" She rolled her eyes and added, "Jack's too, I guess." 

"I don't drink coffee, Lewis." Wasn't that a bombshell to drop on her, she of the caffeine addiction. Brock's lips quirked at the corners and the crows feet around his eyes crinkled. 

Darcy sighed and frowned dramatically as she took a step forward as the line moved. "Just think, if I don't get this coffee, I might not make it through the day, wouldn't you just feel terrible, Commander?" She batted her long lashes in a facsimile of pleading.

Brock's eyes dropped to the earbuds hanging around her neck and shook his head, dark hair gelled to stay out of his eyes. "Just tell me what you want, I'll get it." Darcy cheered inside, he had given in! "I don't know what God awful shit opera you're listening to today, but I could hear it from the gym." Tuesday's were for easy listening. "I like Wednesday's music better." He gestured to her neck.

"For real, Commander?" Jack Rollins cracked a smile in public for the first time in ten years behind them. Brock rolled his eyes at her. Darcy continued happily, "Just a double shot latte. I'll be here late tonight." It was already three in the afternoon and a twelve page continuing report of the unrest in Syria wasn’t going to write itself. She reached into her pocket to pull out her thin wallet.

Brock waved at her hand, "Put that shit away, I know how much you make."

Darcy clapped him on the shoulder and thanked him seriously, because coffee was serious business, before sitting down at one of the small metal tables with a solo chair parked at it. 

She watched Jack lean over Brock's shoulder and speak quietly with him. Whatever he said garnered him a hard elbow to his stomach between his open tac-vest. Jack put his hands on Brock's shoulders before he ushered him forward and laughed, seeing the man's intense face change completely was shocking. The man had been insufferable since Brock admitted to what was going on. Brock had messaged her after Jack needled him with questions to inform her that he knew. Darcy fessed up and said that Midori also was in on their down-low soulmate status. Jack had popped by to check on Delahany, to mock her music, ask about Midori after seeing the two of them eating lunch together, and then he'd come back late in the afternoon to scold Delahany because he had been searching for banana shoes on eBay.

The scolding had been her favorite part. 

Midori insisting that she give Jack her number had been Darcy's least favorite part. 

The two men found her quickly after they acquired their drinks and Brock slipped a large coffee cup onto the table with a bakery bag. "You could have your own office with your own private coffee maker, think about it." 

Darcy flipped him the bird on the side of her coffee cup and Jack laughed again. "Get on with your weapons training, maybe ya boy might learn something so he can finish his e-training and get off my floor." Brock only gave her one of his small happy smiles in return before him and Jack stalked across the atrium and through a controlled access door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you liked!


	4. Spreading Rumors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brock tries to convince Darcy to get an office that locks....again! Brock goes on his first lengthy mission since returning, and the whole of SHIELD can't stop talking about their relationship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always thanks for all of the continued support and lovely comments! it has kept me going during this. ANNNNNND somehow this is stretching upwards of 23k words, literally the longest thing I have ever wrote as a continuous story. so kudos to all of you and I hope the plot is to your liking!

Commander Rumlow, definitely Commander Rumlow And not Brock, stood in the doorway as Darcy gathered the leftover paper copies of the dossiers she had printed for the briefing. She could hear him speaking in a low voice to the head of Weapons Distribution, Officer Ndung'u. After researching this particular topic off and on for six months, it didn't look good, especially if the head of Weapons Distribution had to be involved. That generally meant international shipping of firearms for agents. Darcy watched out of the corner of her eye as he rubbed his burned ear and then across the closely cropped hair he kept after his Crossbones days. 

Darcy bent at the waist and looked over her glasses, STRIKE Commander Rumlow and Weapons Officer Ndung'u grasped each other by the hand with a firm clasp at the end of their low conversation and nodded to one another. Ndung'u nodded and slipped in a little wink towards Darcy, like he knew that her and Brock had something more than co-worker status. With a thin smile, his statuesque body floated down the hallway. It was always fun to watch him move like a wizard around the campus, Darcy was still trying to figure out how he moved his bulk around as silently as Natasha.

"Yes, Commander?" She stood with the loose paper in her hands and dropped it on the table until it was all flush. Darcy grasped the pages and with force, ripped them in half, a wide smile graced her bright red lips.

He leaned an arm against the door jam, Darcy didn't miss his bicep flexing under his black button-up. "Agent Lewis, have you given any more thought to a locking office?"

She tapped the heel of her brown leather pumps on the linoleum tile and thought for a moment. Pulling her shoulders up into a shrug, Darcy felt her goldenrod dress bunch. The O neckline moved closer to her neck and she could feel the fabric across her chest get tighter. "Not really, Commander." 

Darcy watched as he tapped his fingers on the metal. "I'm serious, if you're working on this, please consider moving."

She bounced the papers off of the thin brown belt around her waist and shook her head, "But what will I do without the noise of floor twelve and the analysts bustling back and forth to the water cooler?"

Brock shook his head and sighed. "You probably would get more done and wouldn't be here wasting your time on Saturdays."

Darcy sashayed towards him, her badge digging into her thigh in her usable small pockets. "Joke's on you," she slapped his chest with the papers as she walked by, "Jane's visiting Nidavellir to learn more about the hammer and then is off to meet Nova Prime on behalf of Terra, so I don't currently have a social life except for Wacky Wednesdays." She smirked before shoving the pages into the locked shredder outside of the room.

Turning abruptly, Darcy looked at him and asked, "Why are you pushing the issue of an office so hard?" She poked him in the shoulder with matching brown nails this time. "I like my cubicle, I like the floor and section I'm working in, I generally like everyone that I see daily, and, somehow, no one has complained about me until your agent moved up there."

Her soulmate put his serious face on, his lips thinned out and his cheekbones looked sharper. "It's not about anyone having an issue with you or how you somehow ended up working in the wrong section. It's about your safety, Darcy." Oh, he was going to play the soulmate card, Darcy knew it! 

His eyes dipped as she started to pull the hem of her dress up. Darcy kept her eyes on him as he caught sight of her concealed firearm between her thighs. "I'm not foolish enough to go around the building unarmed, Brock." Those sharp cheekbones turned the slightest shade of pink under his olive skin tone before she finished, "The only two places I go without my firearm are the pool and The Archives." 

His arm dropped from the door and he took a step forward to close the gap between them. Brock grasped the edge of her dress and pulled the tight stretchy material back to her knees. Their eyes locked and he said, "Don't let _anyone_ see that."

Darcy trailed a hand around his hip, against the top of his grey trousers, until she met the hard metal of a concealed weapon under his shirt. "Look who's talking, you probably have one at your ankle along with the one on your belt."

Brock tapped her thigh lightly and shook his head. "Read the manual and see _exactly_ who is authorized to conceal carry in the building, Darcy." He moved his hand up to her curved waist and squeezed lightly, "That's why you need a private office."

~~

Brock was kitted out in the basics of his tactical gear, the uniform that STRIKE agents wore before they boarded the Quinjet. He wore his thick combat boots, black tactical cargo pants, large utility belt, and his tight, breathable uniform shirt with the STRIKE ALPHA Logo on the sleeve. He had two pistols loaded and holstered on the belt and a collapsible baton. The only people that might have been able to count the amount of knives on his person were Natasha and Bucky Barnes, and who knew where either of them actually were any more. (If he knew, Delahany would be at a desk)

That morning he had received the call for a mission briefing. STRIKE Alpha was going to be heading to break up another high profile hostage situation. It was an easy mission to ease himself back into SHIELD protocols. Crossbones lived by noones rules or protocols, the more chaos he caused, the better. 

Brock wasn't a selfish soulmate, he made a promise to himself as a young man that no matter who his soulmate was, they would know everytime he was sent on a mission. He didn't want them to be blindsided by terrible news if it came. But, he couldn't get a hold of Darcy. She was not at her desk, she was not at the cafe, she was not debriefing Hill or Fury or Coulson. Fuck, she wasn't answering her mobile phone either. He knew, though, that she never missed water aerobics unless she was sick. Brock knew she was in the building still, her swipe card had been activated at seven this morning and she hadn't checked out yet. 

He stood at the entrance to the natatorium. The water aerobics group swam and sloshed to upbeat pop music in front of him, the instructor called different moves out. It was a group of mostly women. The two men that were there, laughing along with the rest of the class, Brock knew they were both recovering from knee replacements. They had been avid gym rats a year ago. Knee issues were the number one reason why any Agent attended the water aerobics classes. 

Darcy's strawberry swim cap was bright in the sea of greens and blue issued SHIELD caps. He sighed. If she hadn't been here then he would have had to break the promise she didn't know about. As he walked into the room, the instructor saw him, waved, and swam over. Third in the chain of command had some perks. 

Carol, the instructor, had been with SHIELD since before he joined. She had been part of SHIELD since the seventies and after her retirement in 1998, she went on to study personal training and now ran different group classes for Agents as an independent contractor. The older woman smiled up at him, leaning against the wall of the pool, arms crossed on the cement. "Good evening, Commander Rumlow!" She had always been bright and bubbly and astutely refused to accept he had been real HYDRA. (Carol liked the pineapple margaritas at Pepe Loco's on Wacky Wednesdays and loved to tell the men from STRIKE Alpha about her exploits looking for 084's.)

Brock hitched his pants at his thighs before he crouched down. "Hi, Carol, I'm here to see Agent Lewis." 

"Oh, Darcy! That'll be no problem." She continued to smile brightly, straight teeth stained at the edges from a forty year cigarette addiction. "She's been very vigilant about making her physical training hours, ya know. She even lifts weights on Tuesdays to make up for the class SHIELD _cancelled_ on Saturdays. I wish all SHIELD agents were as dedicated to their physical fitness as she is." 

Brock wasn't sure if Carol was being serious or not. Most likely she was looking at the world through rose colored glasses. But then again, Darcy's physical fitness test was the most basic one could get, he didn't even know that physical fitness tests were that basic. "That's good to hear," Brock laughed and added, "Maybe Delahany can learn something from her while he's up there."

Carol shook her head and a crooked finger at him. "That Delahany, more trouble than he's worth, I've been saying it for eight years. But do they listen to ol' me? Commander Tanaka, she came to me after he was transferred to you, I'll tell you all about it at the next Wacky Wednesday." Carol looked over her shoulder and Brock watched as Darcy started to bounce through the water towards them. "Ah, here she comes! If she needs to leave a little early, I won't dock it off her time here, Commander, I understand life happens sometimes, we do work in that kind of environment." 

"Thanks, Carol." He nodded his head at her. "It's appreciated."

The woman made a gesture with a wet hand splashing his boots, "Now if that appreciation would extend to a raise…." She wagged her brows. 

"Yeah, yeah, I'll bring it up with Hill." It was an on-going conversation between the two that usually came to raised voices and spilled margaritas at Pepe Loco's. Brock always ended up taking a taxi back to his place after telling her there wasn't any room in the budget this quarter for a raise.

She winked before she turned back to her class and bellowed, "Flutter kicks for two minutes people!" Kylie Minogue echoed around the pool.

"Brock." Darcy stood at the wall. His eyes dipped down and looked at her, they slid past her face and looked lower, his teeth bit at his lower lip for a moment. The sleek suit could only hide so much of her generous bust. "Pervert." She muttered.

His eyes snapped back up to her face. "You mind if we talk for a minute? I've been trying to reach you all day."

Darcy assessed him. "I've been down in the archives all day."

"Explains why you didn't answer your phones." The archives were seven floors underground surrounded by a Faraday cage and locking check points. He stood and moved to the pile of towels on a shelf as she waded to the steel ladder to exit the pool. Brock's eyes roamed her curvaceous body as she pulled herself up, water sluicing down her body and onto the floor. He was one lucky sonofabitch to have her as a soulmate. 

Brock walked over to her with the large towel and draped it around her. "You actually want to talk?" Darcy questioned. Brock guided her close to the door before he turned to look at her. "Also, you're super extra militarized today." She poked the side of his belt where he kept a can of mace between two garrots.

"Yeah, it's why we have to talk." He reached for her shoulder that was wrapped in the white towel and held her softly. Biting the inside of his cheek, Brock dropped his head and looked up through his dark fringe. "I just wanted you to know that I'm leaving on a mission."

Darcy narrowed her eyes at him. "Is that it?" She arched a brow.

Brock's face relaxed into an exasperated expression. "It's not it, take this seriously." He gripped her shoulder firmer as his voice dropped to a whisper. "You're my soulmate and I wanted you to know just in case something happened. You're included in my medical file to be alerted if something happens now." 

Darcy looked surprised, did she not think that he would adjust his file to include her? "Is this some chivalry thing?" She asked as she reached across her chest to hold his hand on her shoulder.

"No." He rolled his eyes. "I wanted you to know." He swallowed thickly as he tried to find a way to lighten the mood. "Delahany will be going with us so you can play your music as loud as you want."

Darcy smiled and patted his hand. "Joke's on you. We had gangsta rap Wednesday with the blessing from Director Hill. Says it improved morale and that Delahany can suck a dick."

Brock sighed. Of course she went up, over and beyond where she needed to go to get the approval for her antics. His hand dropped from her shoulder to her waist and he held her there. "Stay out of trouble, if you can." 

"Kick ass and take names, Commander." She took a small step closer to him. "Everyone's going to be asking me questions while you're gone, you know. No one's ever come to visit me during my P.T. time. Especially not Mr. Third In Command."

His hand gripped her hip tighter. Brock held back from pulling her closer towards him, didn't need to give people any more ammunition for gossip before he left for who-knows how long. "Ain't their business." She bit her lip and a blush graced her cheeks. "Just want you to be safe and for you to know I'll be away."

He felt Darcy's cool hand thread through his belt loop and pull _him_ forward. "You stay safe, Commander, don't jump from the jet without a parachute. Promise?"

They looked at each other, Brock's eyes searched hers and he licked his lips. "Yeah, I promise." 

Darcy nodded and tapped his lean waist. "Go get 'em tiger!"

~~

Darcy huffed and waved around the grilled chicken she speared on her fork. "I don't understand why all of these people find my personal life so interesting."

Her friend twisted off the cap to her water bottle and took a drink. "Do you want to know what they are saying, or do you want to know what they are saying?" Oh, Darcy could tell Midori was not putting up with anyone talking about Darcy behind her back.

"I guess I'll take option one, what are they saying?" Darcy shoved the chicken in her mouth and chewed as Midori started telling her what she heard.

She held up a red painted finger, "First, everyone in Logistics thinks he's your sugar daddy and that you're in it for the money, I have not tried to convince them otherwise." A second finger went up, "Ann-Marget in Weapon Design is convinced that you keep him on a leash outside of work, yes, a literal leash, leather, studs, the whole gamut. Ndung’u shut that down real quick, though."

Darcy choked on her chicken before she put her fork down, "Are you kidding me?"

She shook her head and pursed her lips, "That sweet baby sunflower, Cameron Klein, that had a gun held to his head by Brock, is the only romantic of the bunch. He has forty dollars on you finally saying yes to a date after turning Brock down for weeks." Darcy rolled her eyes, oh Cam. "A good portion of the flight line believes ya'll are a good match, evidently you're the kind of woman Brock would usually date: intelligent, intimidating, and irresistible." Her eyes flashed playfully, "And of course, there are the out-liers who believe you're soulmate's but are keeping it on the downlow." Darcy watched her friend give a passing agent a glare. "There's also some assholes," she hissed loudly, "that believe he is still HYDRA and has recruited you."

Choking on her iced coffee, Darcy sputtered, "What the fuck, who would think that?"

Louder, Midori's voice echoed after the agent who walked by and said, "Scum. Bags."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> leave me some sugar


	5. Time to Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brock returns from the mission and they talk about the mission.  
> Darcy sees Brock's family photo.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm probably going to be updating every other day from here on out (like I have been from the beginning.. fyi)  
> I want to thank all of you for continuing to read this, that makes me so happy you don't even know. this thing has creeped up to the 25k word area and its my ride or die fic right now.   
> SHOUT OUT TO ALL THE LOVELY READERS OUT THERE. (yeah I mean YOU!)

It's almost two weeks later that Midori sent her an excited text. Evidently Jack Rollins had messaged her the moment they landed the Quinjet to tell her he was back stateside and in the building. Darcy was still waiting, seven hours later, for a message from Brock. After feeling worried in the morning, it moved into the sads, and eventually stopped at irrevocable anger.

Her typing was heading into the punching of keys territory when the familiar shadow of her soulmate fell over her screen. Muse's _Supermassive Black Hole_ played loudly through her headphones before he reached down and pulled an earbud out of her ear. "What did that keyboard do to you?" 

She ground her teeth and side eyed him. "You." Darcy typed out a flurry of text across the screen. Fucking fires. Fucking kangaroos. Fucking climate change. "You didn't…" she huffed and quickly turned her chair to look at him.

Brock was freshly showered, his hair still wet around the ears. He was wearing a loose grey t-shirt and dark blue jeans over a pair of stylish leather shoes. "I didn't what, Lewis?"

Darcy pointed up at him. This time her nails were deep green, the same green that his words were on her ass. "I had to hear through Midori who got a text from Jack that you guys were back." She crossed her arms and stared with her jaw clenched. "And if you ask me, that's absolute bullshit."

"You know I'm the STRIKE Commander, right? _The STRIKE Commander_?" He pointed back at her, forearm flexing before he pointed back at his chest. "I have responsibilities after we land. Unlike my second in-command, I don't get to just check out after debrief." Brock shook his head. "Plus, my phone died while we were away. I left it on in my office drawer by accident." He dropped his gesturing hand and started to count on his fingers. "I have to do gear requisitions, safety assessments, an extra debrief with Hill and Fury _by myself_ , and if necessary, discipline my dumb ass subordinates." He took a deep breath. "If I had known you were here, _on a Saturday_ , I would have just called up to your desk."

She continued to stare at him, teeth biting the inside of her cheek to keep herself from saying something she'd regret in five minutes. "I need to finish this report." Darcy believed him but, really, how much time did a text take after his phone had enough charge to message her. Fuck she had been at her desk all day, Saturday be damned. 

"Are you really going to be like this?" Brock sighed. 

Darcy closed her eyes and tapped her manicured nails against her knees. "Just come back in an hour or something." Darcy let her shoulders drop to release some tension. "I was worried that something happened after I didn't hear from you and I was waiting for a call from Medical. Let me decompress."

Brock nodded at her. Darcy was surprised. She was expecting a fight from him.

An hour (on the dot) later, her phone buzzed aggressively next to her keyboard. It was Brock. She sighed and opened the message. It was a picture of a coffee and her favorite mango parfait. "Ugh. Men." 

Lauren, from surveillance, said, "Amen, sister," as she walked by. 

"Ugh," Darcy stretched the noise out long before she put her forehead against her desk. Soulmate's were.. she didn't know what to think. Her and Brock had been dancing around the issue. Their conversation at the pool had been the most intimate interaction that they had had since showing each other their words and deciding that they should keep it on the down low for the moment. 

Her phone chimed again. **Take a break?**

She picked her phone up and messaged him back. _Where?_

Darcy rolled her face to the side and rested her cheek on the cool desk. **Cafe or my office?**

_I want to have words. Your office._ She sent back quickly.

**Ok.** He sent a thumbs up emoji with it.

Who still fucking sent thumbs up emojis? Darcy lifted her head before she started saving all of her working documents. With a sigh, she shut down her computer and pulled the SHIELD issued ID card out of the computer hastily. The rest of her report could be worked on remotely when she went home. Darcy grabbed her messenger bag and made her way to the elevators and down to the STRIKE floor. The women and men who were in the hallway nodded to her and Darcy, with her angry face still on, tersely nodded back.

For someone who gave her shit for playing music loudly, she noticed that there were heavy bass lines coming from the direction of his office. It's not surprising that he would like the loudest band on Earth. Crashes of cymbals and power ballad harmonies flowed from beyond his door. Fucking Manowar, of course. 

Darcy rapped loudly at the cracked door to Brock's office with her knuckles before she heard him say, "Come in."

She pushed the heavy door and let it fall closed behind her with a creak. Darcy dropped her bag onto the chair she showed Brock her mark in before she walked around his desk and stared down at him. Brock turned in his chair and looked up at her with soft hazel eyes, the crows feet weren't as pronounced with his concerned look and his unkempt dark hair was curling around his ears. How could she stay mad when he looked like that? Easily. That's how. They stared at one another in silence until Darcy finally gave in, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and emphatically said, "I am angry at you because I was worried about you." She squeezed him and continued, "Now I know how Laura and Jane feel and it is absolutely fucking terrible, Commander." 

He wrapped a hand around her waist and held her back. Brock's free hand reached for the volume on his speakers and turned them down. "I didn't want you to worry."

"Too bad, it happened." She felt his other hand move around her. With a steady pressure, he pulled her until she sat on his skinny knees. "You're my soulmate, dude, I couldn't help it." Darcy's hand held his cheek, a thick shadow of a beard had started to grow while he had been on the mission. This close, she was able to see the grey hairs peppering his temples and growing through his beard. Fuck, that was one hell of a reminder of how much older he was.

His other arm fell to encircle her waist before Brock leaned his forehead against her. "This soulmate business is new to me." They leaned against one another and Darcy's eyes closed as he continued, "It's my first time doing this. Next time I'll do better. You're right, a text takes two seconds. I should have checked to see if you were in the building, and if you were here I should have gone right to your desk with my Steyr across my back the moment we landed."

"Yeah, you should have, but you probably would have intimidated all of my weekend warrior co-workers on level twelve." Darcy sighed and rubbed his cheek. "No one ever told me that having a soulmate was.. complicated. Everyone just talks about their warm fuzzies and how good it feels to be connected to someone." His hand held her hip tighter. "We've just been tiptoeing around it, not talking about it for a month, longer now that you went on the mission." She brushed her hand through his hair and held the back of his head, "Midori's soulmate died while deployed in '09 and she had no advice for me. She's just out there having fun with Jack and doesn't have to worry about the soulmate business. Jane has Thor, so their bond isn't anything like an average Midgardian bond, especially now that she is wielding the hammer, and Laura and Clint are currently off grid and I can't grill them for information," Darcy rambled.

After she stopped, Brock said, "Jack's soulmate died during the up-rising. She was real Hydra." Brock lifted his hand up and held her cheek. "It's the only reason I'm not writing his ass up right now. He knows he shouldn't be on the phone until after debrief. He's been through some shit and I'm sorry you had to hear through them, and not from me, that we were back."

Darcy opened her bright blue eyes and looked at Brock, really looked. She saw the regret there. She saw the hope. Darcy saw someone who looked like they actually gave a shit about her. "We got to talk about the soulmate stuff." Her free arm wound around his shoulders and she leaned against his sturdy chest. "We can't just sweep it under the carpet and pretend it isn't happening. I want more than snarky quips and coffee." She closed her eyes again. "I've had a lot of time to think while you've been away." 

"Thinking's all I've done since meeting you, Darcy." Brock's hands twined in the ends of her dark hair as he said, "I don't want you to be targeted because you're my soulmate." He whispered.

"Could I be?" She sighed and leaned heavily against him.

His arms held her steadfastly. "It's a real possibility. I spoke with Maria about it. Her soulmate is a civilian. He wants nothing to do with shadow agencies. She keeps him as safe as she can, which means, she doesn't talk about having a soulmate at all. She's lucky that her mark only lightened to a dark dark grey so she can pass it off as still haven't met the guy." Brock paused and held her a little tighter, "Probably helps that they aren't romantically involved either."

"I'm already neck deep in this shit, and have been for eight years." She cleared her throat and looked up at him coyly, "I never wanted a platonic soulmate, and maybe we should talk about that after we talk about personal security. I mean, are we talking about attempted kidnappings or just straight up someone trying to murder me? Because I'm not really too interested in either of those things happening."

"Don't even joke about that. Knowing Jane and Thor was just a strike of a match to what kidnappers…." He trailed off. "I should be a better soulmate. You deserve a better soulmate."

"Bullshit, Brock." She shook her head. "You're a sassy mother fucker who matches me quip for quip once we put the awkward soulmate business aside. No one else in my life can keep up." Her hand continued to hold his cheek. "I just want more than quips. Do you have a girlfriend I should know about? A boyfriend? Another soulmate?"

Brock snorted. "No. This job made it hard for me to settle down, Crossbones made it hard for any kind of personal relationship with anyone, too." He paused before he trailed his hands to her face. Brock turned her head so he could look into her slowly blinking eyes. "Plus, I was waiting for my soulmate. Not..you know.. biblically, but, I wanted to be with my soulmate, it's all I've ever wanted. It was the only thing that kept me going while recovering as Crossbones." Her eyes welled with tears. "I never imagined my soulmate would be half as great as you. You've saved the world… twice. You smoothed over all my dumb mercenary shit before I even knew who you were. You keep SHIELD on the up and up. Fury's wary of you. Carol loves you. Jack doesn't like anyone and he wants you to stick around, and not because of your friend or what you have under your skirt." 

"Don't make me cry, dude." Darcy sniffed before he moved his thumbs to wipe away the few tears that fell from her eyes.

"I'm really fucking lucky to have found you after all the shit I've been through, so don't think I want to tiptoe around this any more." He continued to search her blue eyes. Darcy blinked more tears away. "I'm just this old man who might be intimidated by his younger, smarter, better looking soulmate."

Darcy moved her body back and laughed. "What? Have you seen you?" She nudged his bicep. "You're just trying to make me feel better."

"Ain't a lie, sweetheart. You're too good for me. Your brains intimidate me, your sass intimidates me, your curves intimidate me, being your soulmate intimidates me."

"Jeeze." Darcy shook her head before she wrapped her arms around his shoulders again. "We got to work on both of us not feeling like we aren't good enough for the other." Her head leaned on his shoulder. "I want to know you, Brock"

An hour later Brock is silent as she taps the edge of the ceramic photo frame. It's an overwhelming portrait of his whole family on his mother's side. There had to be at least fifty of them, and if what he said was true, all couples were soulmate's who have weathered all kinds of storms. His grandparents sat in the middle of the group in polished sleek wheelchairs and around them on the ground were all of the great-grand children his four brothers and sisters had plus his twelve cousins. Each one of his mother's siblings had two children each. It was obvious that Brock took his looks from her side of the family. Everyone in the family was olive skinned with sharp cheekbones and a smile that matched his grandmother's thin lips. 

Darcy paused and ran a finger over his body in the photo. "So, do they get together often? Like, this is a lot of people. It's just Jane for me, maybe her mom if we are in the UK." Darcy moved to sit on his hard desk somewhere between them admitting they never wanted to marry someone not their soulmate and Jack walking in on Brock leaning over to attempt kissing her. Jack was a fucking cock-block. 

Brock nodded his head before answering, "Just Christmas Eve now." He held onto Darcy's ankles as she rested her feet on him. "Ma has enough room at the house to host all the Mancini's, pop's the only one left of the Rumlows'. Aunt Ramona hosted a party on Fourth of July in '01 once, but after cleaning up after fifty people she wasn't too pressed to host again. Or it could have been Andrea, J.R. and Serena vomiting in her pool. There were a lot of variables that day."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ALSO LOOK WAY ABOVE.  
> SURPRISE I ADDED AN EPILOGUE TO WRAP ALL THE THINGS TOGETHER!
> 
> and in future chapters.. I might have modeled Brock's Italian family after my own Italian family. (I literally can't name all of my first cousins because I have so many)


	6. It's Amore!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They finally go on a date!
> 
> Then, they video chat Brock's mother (not while on the date)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading! here is the next part
> 
> NOT SORRY ABOUT THE SLOW BURN

It had been Darcy's idea to go on a date. After they spoke more about their soulmate insecurities with one another until they finished their cold coffees and made a game plan. He was standing in front of her townhouse after ringing the doorbell twice. Pulling at the neckline of his shirt, Brock waited. Going to dinner and a movie as a fifty one year old man shouldn't scare the shit out of him. He was STRIKE Alpha's Commander. He jumped out of planes. He's stopped international coups. He went undercover as part of Obama's personal security for a season to suss out sleeper HYDRA agents. He could do this.

Darcy pulled her front door open quickly before she grabbed his forearm and hauled him inside. "Mrs. Silva is too nosey, don't stand out there so long next time, she'll come over and start grilling you like she's my mom or something."

"Your door was unlocked?" Brock asked after she let go of his arm and walked towards her sofa. 

"Yeah, so you could walk in." She looked at him through a thick fall of brown hair. "I don't usually keep it unlocked." Hitching the back of her blouse up, Darcy showed him her small leather holster with a Springfield XDM Compact handgun sitting in it. "It's not like I'm unarmed or anything, you know that."

He couldn't do this. Brock's eyes widened as he caught sight of the handgun resting against her milk white skin and a trickle of pleasure pooled in his stomach, the same feeling he had a month ago when she had flashed him her inner thigh. A smile pulled at his lips as he stood in the entryway to her home, "I underestimate you daily, Darcy." 

Waving a hand, Darcy stuffed her shirt back into her skirt. "Yeah, yeah, you probably have a million knives and twenty guns on you right now, my pea shooter ain’t shit compared to your arsenal. I'll get you a key if you're so worried about me keeping the door unlocked for you." Brock bit his cheek to keep quiet as she sat on her black suede couch to slip on a pair of low, sparkly, purple heels, dismissing him

"Did you want to drive or?" Brock asked before she stood and smoothed her skirt back over her knees.

Side eyeing him, Darcy pursed her blood red lips before laughing. "If you really want to ride in Clarice, my shit box Honda Civic, then yeah I'll drive. My clutch is about to blow, but I'm sure I can get us to dinner and back." She pulled a fitted leather jacket across her shoulders. Darcy adjusted her collar and added, "We might get pulled over because of the cracked windshield, just warning you."

Brock slipped his hands into his pockets and leaned against the wall, he didn't know what to say to that. Finally, he settled and said, "Alright...uh..we'll take my Jeep." His eyes lingered on the seams running up the back of her calves and thighs. Subconsciously he licked his lips, he said, "Might have to boost you up though, it has a lift kit."

"In D.C.? I knew you were secretly a frat-boy under all the," she motioned at his face, "scowly Italian-ness." With a jangle, Darcy grabbed a dainty unfamiliar handbag, her keys, and cell phone before she stood next to him. "Plus, if you wanted to touch my ass again, all you had to do was ask."

Brock made a gesture with his hands before he wrapped an arm around her waist. "Who wouldn't want to, but there's time for that later," he said suggestively. Darcy laughed at him and rolled her eyes. "You look phenomenal tonight." She looked up at him with bright eyes as he continued, "You...uh... always look phenomenal."

"You charmer." Darcy nudged his shoulder with her knuckles. "You're looking pretty handsome yourself." She wiggled her brows before they exited her townhouse and moved towards the blacked out Jeep parked in front of her garage. "And, I don't know which cologne you're wearing, but please don't wear it to work, you'll have to beat the women off with a stick smelling like that." 

~~

Darcy pointed at an open space on the dimly lit street near the theater. Smoothly, Brock parallel parked the Jeep before he turned the engine off. "I'm really glad you gave me a dress code because my usual date night clothes would not have been up to par for that." She smiled widely at him. 

"Obelisk?" Brock asked. "You could have shown up in a potato sack. They don't give a shit about that there unlike some places in D.C." He unbuckled his seat belt and pocketed the key ring. "You just look even more gorgeous dressed to the nines."

Darcy looked at him and smiled, "So it was all for you?"

"Are you pretending that teasing the rest of the men in the restaurant didn't make you happy?" Darcy had bent over as they were leaving to pick up an earring that had 'fallen'... A man had walked into a wall and a waiter had dropped an empty glass. They caught each other's eyes and smiled widely at one another. They had also caught women staring as he walked by tables. It had been fun. "So, what movie are we going to?"

Darcy put her phone into the breast pocket of her jacket before asking, "You like those old black and white films right?" 

They had agreed to surprise each other for the date. He would pick the restaurant this time and she would pick the movie. Brock wasn't sure what he was in for because there wasn't a theater that he knew of in this neighborhood.

Outside of the building, there was a small A-frame sign saying that the screening for the night was the 1931 original reel of Dracula. Brock didn't feel that "theater" was the correct word for a completely black painted square room with a hundred fold out chairs. A large DIY projector screen, that was mostly a white sheet and some wood scaffolding, was set up on the small riser stage at the front of the room. A string quartet was set up to the side tuning their instruments as Brock and Darcy found seats that they were comfortable in: good sightlines, easy access to exits, even easier access if someone needed to pee without climbing across six other people. The host for the night introduced himself and the members of the quartet before giving his audience a little background information about Bela Lugosi's Dracula and the score for the movie that was finally written in 1998. The enthusiasm the host had for the film spilled over to the audience and there was cheering from a (possibly drunk?) crowd of twenty-something year olds with spiked leather jackets, dyed hair, and an unstoppable lust they had for living fast and dying young. Brock knew that look, had worn it many times himself.

When the movie was over and the last trembling notes of the cello rang around the room, the whole audience stood and clapped for the production, it was a perfect night out this close to Halloween. Darcy hooked her elbow with his and leaned against him as they walked out. He watched her throughout the movie and was glad to see that she was actually enjoying the film. Many other women that he had dated would watch old films with him but would become bored and fidgety half-way through. Darcy's intrigue lasted through the whole thing, so did her threading her fingers with his to hold him through the production. 

Outside, they moved towards his Jeep a few paces behind the group of rowdy friends. They were jumping on one another's backs and jovially telling each other their favorite part of this particular screening, it sounded like this was a monthly event the host put on and that they religiously attended. Classic movies with live scores. And, it sounded like the host sometimes played films where it was the last known copy of the reel on earth. Brock put that information away, definitely something to look into for a future date.

When they pulled back up to her house, Darcy insisted that he come inside for a few minutes, especially since he was always so concerned with her personal safety. She had been quiet on the ride home and he didn't want to interrupt whatever she might have had going on up in her brain space so Brock weaved through traffic and shifted smoothly from one gear to another without saying a word.

She shed her jacket at the door and tossed her keys in the basket under the coat hooks before toeing off her heels. "What'd you think?"

Brock stared at her feet, his eyes traveling up the path the seams of her stockings made. He watched as she grabbed a loose hair tie to pile her hair up in a disheveled knot. It was perfect, is what he thought. Did that sound too eager? Was he falling for the soulmate fuzzies? Did Jack spill the beans about him secretly loving Halloween and the season that came with it? Brock stepped closer to her and wrapped an arm around her waist. To hell with it, why should he lie to her, they were soulmates after all, "It was perfect." He felt her hand in his belt loop again pulling him forward. Brock looked down and she smiled widely up at him. "Best date I've ever been on."

Her hands moved up his chest and held the lapels of his jacket. Darcy pulled him down a little closer to her before she rose into her toes and kissed the side of his mouth. "Yeah, it really was." Brock melted into her arms and wove his arms behind her back, ignoring the weight of her firearm that nudged against his elbow.

~~

“I see you kept the Basquiat,” Brock’s mother said after they introduced themselves. Dary sat close to Brock on his worn-in couch. 

Both of them turned their heads and Darcy took in the artwork behind them. The painting was mostly red, some yellow, and white. The artist, Basquiat, had drawn over the paint with figures and words, Darcy knew who Basquiat was, she took that one required art and humanities class while at University. “Just because I died doesn’t mean all my belongings were auctioned off to the highest bidder, ma.”

“You have a Basquiat just hanging in your living room?” Darcy stared at Brock like he had seven heads. She isn’t ashamed of the staring so she turned her head and stared at his mother too. “He just has a Basquiat hanging in his living room?”

His mother, Valentina, took a sip from the very full martini glass in her hand. “Well, it doesn’t really match the Miro in his bedroom, does it?” She lifted a dark brow, smirked the same smirk that Brock had, and sipped at her martini, ignoring the large olive at the bottom.

“You know I keep all the gifts you give me,” Brock shook his head at his mother and Darcy continued to look between the two of them baffled, “I never throw away any of _your_ gifts.”

Valentina places the martini out of the camera’s view and she looked pointedly at him, “Please don’t tell me you sold the solitaire sapphire necklace your father set for you.” Darcy took a large gulp of her own red wine and tried not to let her eyes get any wider. “Are you alright Darcy?” Kudo’s to Brock’s mother for remembering her name, Ian’s family sure as hell didn’t. Ass-bags.

Darcy held up a hand and nodded, “Yeah, I’m alright,” she cleared her throat, “What was it you both did again?”

“Brock,” she shook her head at her son, “You haven’t told her?” Valentina rolled her matching hazel eyes and that had Darcy holding back a laugh with a small smile, it was an expression she had seen a hundred times now.

Brock’s hands lifted from his knees and motioned at the camera, “What, ma? I just sprung the whole fuckin’ family on her the other day.” Darcy’s teeth bit her red lip as he draped an arm around her shoulders, “You try breaking it to your soulmate that they are inheriting at least fifty new relatives that’ll be botherin’ her night an' day if they get her number.”

She took another sip from her martini and answered, “I did Brock.” Valentina looked at Darcy through the camera, “Darlin, his father was the last of the Rumlow’s, Korea and Vietnam, fuckin’ bullshit if you ask me.” Her martini glass was half empty, “But don’t you worry, he’s well taken care of now.” 

Darcy tipped her glass and drank more of her wine as Brock said, “Cousin Andrea is never allowed to get her number, I don’t need her beggin’ Darcy to go shopping on fifth avenue,” he paused, “we work for the _government_ , how does she not understand that?” Brock shook his freshly cut hair and a lock of hair flopped against his forehead. Darcy reached out and pushed it back for him. “But these two,” his mother gave her a little finger wave, “Ma’s used to be in the art industry, buying and selling for Christie’s and Sotheby’s, now-a-day’s she’s doing preservation and restoration.” Darcy felt his hand squeeze her shoulder through her thin black shirt, “Pop’s is in jewelry appraising now.”

“You show her the beautiful pieces he made for you!” His mother shouted, “His father made beautiful jewelry. Beautiful, and what did Bulgari do? Fuckin’ ripped him off the whole fuckin’ time.” With an emphatic gesture she added, “Just be glad you were just a baby in the eighties, honey, nothing good came from the eighties. It was all cocaine, parties, and goddamn thieves.” She put back the rest of her martini.

“Fuckin’ Bulgari.” Brock’s accent got thicker and Darcy snorted with laughter. “They don’t even know jewelry. Give me a sip of that wine,” Darcy passed him the glass and he took a sip before he passed it back to her. “Pop’s he was the first to fashion jewelry for the rappers.”

“Vinny-D, he was working over in Manhattan at the time, ya know, made an appointment for Kurtis Blow.”

“Uh...Kurtis Blow?” Darcy asked between the family shouting back and forth at one another. 

“Do don’t know Kurtis Blow?” Valentina looked surprised, “First rap record that ever went gold? I thought you said she knew music?”

“Darcy, how do you not know Kurtis Blow?” Brock looked betrayed.

She shrugged and laughed as she drank the rest of her wine slow and steady. “She knows Run DMC though? Everyone knows Run DMC. Vic did all of the jewelry. He did the gold in-lay on the shell toes. When Brock saw those, he had to have a pair, ya know.” Valentina laughed, “And look at her go, she’ll fit right in at Christmas!” 

Darcy choked on the rest of her drink. “I’m not sure what is worse, Brock wanting shell toes or my alcoholism in this scenario.”

Together, Brock and his mother said, “Shell toes.”

“Where’s Vic again?” Darcy asked.

“Upstate somewhere, one those old families, Rockafeller’s or something.” Darcy watched her sneer, “Appraising gaudy nasty blood jewels from the turn of the century. I’ll text you a picture of the garbage they have him appraising.”

Brock tightened his grip on Darcy and she smiled over at him. Watching him relax with his family was new. It was nice, his shoulders had dropped an inch, and even though she ribbed him about the way he sat, Brock sank another inch into the couch relaxing back into the conversation. “They didn’t even polish the silver, did they?”

His mother reached for something and came back to the screen and unwrapped a chocolate. Around the candy she said, “You’d think for these ultra-millionaires they’d take better care of their jewelry.” She licked her teeth, “You take care of your jewelry, don’t you?”

Snorting, Darcy laughed into her empty glass. “I don’t own any jewelry.”

She looked taken aback. “Brock, get up and get her that thing, that necklace from ninety seven.”

“Ma, she doesn’t want a four foot string of pearls. What do you think this is? Kay’s Jewelers from 1954 or something?”

“Wait a minute,” Darcy put a finger in Brock’s face, “don't put words in my mouth, I definitely want a four foot string of pearls.”

Valentina gestured, “See, what woman doesn’t like a nice piece of jewelry?”

As the conversation devolved into Valentina scolding Brock for not showering her with gifts and Vic leaving her alone for the weekend in the city, Darcy realized that she didn’t mind this kind of madness, it was like dealing with scientists, just with less things that might explode. Except maybe someone’s temper, it sounded like Cousin Melissa was prone to tossing pie plates at the end of the night if she had hit the Aperol too hard.

And, Brock hadn't sold off the solitaire sapphire necklace. It looked fantastic on her. (Later that night, they found out that Darcy also looked great in the string of pearls, just the string of pearls.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter, the story earns the M rating


	7. We Earn The M Rating Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We earn the M rating.  
> Darcy Wow's Brock.  
> Brock's brothers are going to get a talkin' to.  
> What the hell happened to Clarice?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO WE EARN THE M RATING HERE.
> 
> thanks for all the lovely reviews and comments yall keep me going in these dark days. 
> 
> also there are dumb jokes in the last 4 sentences of the story.. and I'm not ashamed of them.
> 
> ENJOY PEOPLES

Brock was staring at her, his mouth slightly agape. "Do I have yogurt on my shirt or something?" Darcy asked after holstering her weapon on her thigh. Brock had let her borrow his rifle to attempt long range shots before she pulled out her handgun, Darcy thought she did pretty well.

Darcy watched as his arm lifted and pressed the recall button for her target sheet. "What the hell was that?"

She was confused, "What the hell was what?" The target came whizzing to the front of the lane, stopped and clinked. She looked at the sheet and nodded, not bad, Brock staring at her had made her first few shots wobble on the twenty five meter silhouette.

"This," he pointed at the target. There were neat holes in the middle of all the black torsos. All. Of. The. Torsos. 

Her eyes looked over the target and she flicked the five hundred meter silhouette. "I need to work on my long range." A few of the rifle bullets had only clipped the side of the five hundred meter, one hit dead center.

"What the hell is this?" He gestured again at the target. The other agents at the range were slowing their shooting to eavesdrop on their conversation. "Why are you sitting at a desk?"

"I don't understand the question." She didn't, this target was actually kind of embarrassing for her. 

"Give me a second." He dramatically took some deep breaths and bent over the lip where people loaded their magazines. "You're going to kill me." Brock held a hand up and waved it at her, "Where do you hide all of this."

She looked at him warily. Had he lost his mind? Did he even know the gibberish he was saying? "Brock, I still don't understand."

He crouched, stuck his head down, and breathed between his knees. "I wanted to see if I could offer any training if you needed it." Brock wheezed, "I know you conceal carry, but, what the fuck is this." A tan arm gestured above him again. "This. Holy hell, I haven't been turned on this fast in twenty fucking years. You're so competent it's sickening."

Darcy kicked at the side of his ass lightly and said, "I put my five required hours a month in just like everyone else. Anyone can do this."

"I've died and gone to heaven. She thinks anyone can do this, anyone." He continues to breathe deeply between his thighs for a moment before he looks up at her, "No, not everyone can do this, I should have known, no soulmate of mine would… holy hell, Darcy."

She pulled the paper down and poked at the five hundred meter target with shimmery purple nail, "I didn't even hit center more than once this time."

"Darcy," Brock held onto her ankle like it was a lifeline, "most agents don't even try to hit the five hundred meter marks." His cheeks were flushed. "I could get the actual number for you, but I can tell you it is less than five percent, most agents don't need to for qualifications so they don't attempt it."

"I thought it was required? I mean, why have it on the target if you're not going to shoot it?" Darcy pursed her lips and thought. "Do you think this is why STRIKE Echo packs up real quick whenever I walk in to do my monthly training? I mean, they always look like they are in the middle of their mags and they see me and just start to pack everything away."

"Darcy," Brock let his legs drop to the floor and leaned against the wall, "No one on STRIKE Echo can hit five hundred meters as accurately as you do." He picked up a few pieces of rolling brass casings and piled them in his hand, "I personally do their weapon qualifications, so I know their numbers."

She crouched in front of him, her holster riding up towards the center of her tight jeans, "You're not fucking with me, are you?" Darcy leaned forward and her shirt hung loosely open at that angle.

"On my grandmother's rabbit sugo recipe, I am not lying." He took some more deep breaths. "You can't be putting your tits in my face after shooting like that or I'll never be able to walk out of here."

Darcy let her lips curl into a smirk, "Is that so, Commander?"

That was all that needed to be said before they quickly picked up the sixty brass casings from the floor and stowed his rifle back into the lightweight case. case. Darcy watched Brock adjust himself as she slipped their eye protection and ear protection into her duffle bag. She zipped the bag slowly and felt Brock step closer to her back, arms bracketing her in as he leaned against the edge of the window. Darcy felt the ghost of his breath on her neck as he said, "You really didn't know?"

The teeth of the zipper clicked one by one until she turned so they were chest to chest. "I really, really didn't know, Commander." She pitched her voice low and let her hands reach for his tight SHIELD issue shirt before she picked at an invisible piece of dust on his chest.

Darcy watched as he closed his eyes tightly and whispered, "This is how I die, hard as hell at the range, done in by my soulmate who keeps the fact that she could be on the sniper team from me, me, the guy who recommends people for the sniper team."

Darcy dusted at his shoulders and with a smart ass accent to her voice she said, "Wasn't trying to keep anything from you, Commander." Darcy stood on her tip toes and kissed his cheek, "Do you think there's anything else you can show me?" 

~~

This was exactly how he was going to lose his job, hands deep in his soulmate's thick hair, pants around his thighs, and her hands and mouth working him hard in the janitor's closet outside the range. After their date over the weekend and the few tentative kisses they shared, Darcy had pushed his jacket off his shoulders and kissed him hard, asking him if he wanted it just as much as she did. Brock gazed down at her in surprise before nodding wordlessly. Eventually, his muscular arms wrapped around her and lifted her by her thick thighs before pinning her next to a Kandinsky print on her living room wall. (He'd talk to his mother and get her a real one)

Come to find out, being fucked against a wall was one of Darcy's fantasies and no one before him had been able to indulge her in it. He couldn't wait to indulge her again.

"Holy…" Brock whispered before licking his lips. He could still taste her arousal on them. Before she dropped to her knees, Brock unstrapped her thigh holster and dragged her jeans past her ankles and pinned Darcy high against the door. She was panting before he even begged her for a taste. She had pulled him in by the hair and wrapped her legs around his shoulders and bit her lip to be quiet. Darcy came with a choked off gasp, pulling his mouth against her core. Once he let her down, Darcy grabbed for her jeans, hauled them to her hips and reached for his thick webbed belt. 

"You're killing me, killing me." Brock whimpered under her hands before he moved his fingers to grip at her shoulder. "Where..where do you want it?"

Darcy backed off before licking around the head of his cock and said, "Right here." That was the only warning he received before her head dipped back down and swallowed him to the hilt. It wasn't much longer after that where he felt Darcy's mouth and tongue sucking the last drop of semen off of him. She wiped a hand across her lips and smiled up at him from between his thighs. 

Brock dropped the hand in her hair and leaned heavily against the door, "I need a moment."

"Don't take too long, because you promised to take me home, Commander, and I'm really interested in what else you might be able to show me," Darcy said cheekily as she stood and buttoned her pants. 

~~

"Do you even know what you do to me when you wear these skirts?" Brock's hand was splayed across her ass, holding her right where her soulmark was. "If Jack had stared any longer at you bending over the table this afternoon during that meeting, I would have clocked him." Darcy's skirt was rucked high on her thighs, past where her garters were holding up her stockings, while she straddled his legs. They were at her townhouse again, Mrs. Silva had waved joyfully at them as she brought her Pomeranian out for his evening walk when they exited Brock's Jeep. He had been manhandled onto the sofa by the tie and belt loops the moment the door locked behind him. Darcy's mouth pressed hard against his as she moved them into the living room. Her teeth nipped at him until he gave her access and they kissed deeply.

Which was where they were, Brock's hand splayed across her ass as he watched Darcy lean back pull the garish cornucopia printed top over her head. Dark eyes roamed her torso as she reached behind herself to unclasp her conservative, black, cotton bra. When she pulled it off, Brock's eyes widened. "Probably the same thing that happens to me when you wear these suits and look disgustingly competent while doing your job, I never realized that disciplining a SHIELD Agent for slanderous gossip involved so much paperwork. Darcy leaned over and caught his lips before pulling away, "I don't think I've ever seen Ndung'u so angry."

Brock connected their foreheads and whispered, "Let's stop talkin' about these other men." Darcy laughed lightly before she caught his lower lip and sucked playfully on it. 

They are topless and Brock has his face between her breasts, kissing a line towards her neck when his phone starts to ring from the other side of the room. It continues to ring until Darcy pulls his head back gently, "Are you really going to ignore your mother right now?"

He nipped at her chin playfully, "She's interrupting."

Carding her hands through his hair and down to his neck, Darcy pushes herself up and grabs his ringing phone. "She never calls Friday nights, and your mom is a creature of habit." Darcy pointed at him, "Your words, not mine." Brock sighed and watched as she swiped the matching red nail across his phone and said, "Hey Valentina, it's Darcy...oh your son? We were just sitting on the couch, just came home from work, going out to see the lights at the zoo later when it gets dark." Darcy laughed and Brock saw her face light up with a grin. He could hear the high voice of his mother talking a mile a minute on the lines' other side, "Interrupting...No... I wouldn't say that exactly." She laughed again, "Yeah, we still have most of our clothes on...No...Yes...I'll ask him to call you back, no problem...yeah...we love you too."

He raised a brow, "You did not just tell my mother that she interrupted us having sex."

Placing his phone back into the key basket, she shook her head. "She apologized to me for interrupting us having sex, unprompted." Darcy walked forward and slipped back into his lap before she recounted, "Evidently, your brothers won't come down from Boston to help her set up for Christmas this year."

His arms tightened around her waist, "Those knuckleheads, if they didn't have seven kids between them I'd crack their skulls together. They're still my younger brothers, and putting ma through that stress; they help set up, I help tear down, it's been that way since my pop's knees gave out. Man isn't able to climb a ladder, so for nineteen years we've had this worked out." He shook his head. "It'd be like Maria and Isabella saying they won't take her to see The Rockettes. Twenty nine years they've been going together." Brock made an emphatic hand gesture to the side of them before shaking his head. "Those stupid…. I'll have a chat with them alright."

Darcy leaned down and kissed him gently, "Sounded more like she wanted us both to help her set up for Christmas, not just you."

"It's a damn trap is what it is." He kissed her back quickly, "That's how she'll get you, pretend it is all about Kris Kringle and then rope you in with the ravioli and wine biscuits." Brock's hands traveled down to where her thighs met her ass and held her. "Then she'd take you to Rosario's to guilt you into looking at goddamn wedding cakes behind my back." 

She tossed her head back and laughed hard, "You really think so?"

Brock narrowed his eyes dangerously, "You don't know how good Rosario's pastries are, strangers have spontaneously proposed to one another after eating dessert separately at the shop." 

"Bullshit," Darcy continued to laugh in his lap. 

Brock nipped at her jaw and down her neck, "I'll introduce you to Polish Bob and his wife. They can tell you all about the magic fucking canollis."

~~

“You said you had a cracked windshield.” He stood at the door to her garage and stared at the car sitting there. The once glossy red paint was peeling all over and there was a spot in her windshield that was completely concave.

Sipping on a whiskey ginger, Darcy shrugged next to him. “I love Clarice but I never drive her anymore so it’s not a big deal.”

"I need a drink," Brock took the highball glass from her hand and took a few large gulps. The glass that he passed back to her only held ice. Horrified, he asked, “What the fuck happened, Darcy?”

"You drank all my whiskey, dude." The sweating glass dripped between them and the ice settled with soft clinks.

Brock shook his head, "I need another drink."

Darcy held the glass out and pointed at Clarice, "You're acting like you've never seen a car hit by Mjolnir."

Brock turned and walked back into her home before grabbing the bottle of Maker's Mark. He unscrewed the waxy red cap and took a sip from the bottle. "I _haven't_ seen a car that has been hit by Mjolnir."

He watched his soulmate shrug noncommittally before she took the bottle and drank from it with a hiss. "You need to get out more, babe." Brock watched her turn with the bottle to head back into the house.

"That's all I'm getting?" He shouted after her. There were so many questions! How many cars has Mjolnir hit? Was Darcy in the car? Was it Jane or Thor who did the smashing? How the hell did Clarice pass inspection...yep, that sticker definitely said three months ago.

A can hissed open in the other room and Darcy replied back to him, "I mean, there isn't much to it. Clarice was collateral damage, it happens."

"Cracked. Windshield." He shouted again.

"It _is_ cracked." Darcy countered as she walked back, two glasses in hand.

Taking the proffered beverage, Brock drank deeply again, "Your windshield is so cracked its name is Tyrone Biggums and Dave Chappelle sued for copyright infringement."

Snorting hard into her drink, Darcy slapped his shoulder, "Clarice is not that bad."

"All the king's horses and all the king's men wouldn't attempt putting Clarice together again, that's how bad she is." Brock shook his head again and ran the hand with the Maker's cap through his recently shorn hair.

Pointedly, Darcy said, "You're going to make Clarice cry, so maybe we should let her be."

"If I have to look at her any more I'm going to cry."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a peek into what is ahead on the Scratches writing bonanza (eventually):  
> Vampire!Darcy  
> Post Snap Brock still burned as Crossbones trying to get his feet under him  
> A fic where Dr. Strange and Wong are _fucking done_ with Darcy and Brock enchanting all of their artifacts  
> Frank's doggo chillen at Brock's momma's house  
> Darcy In Charge origins  
> some Natasha/Darcy  
> and OHMERGERD. i wrong work to Craigslist missed connections. wtf even. and I'm going to finish NOT JANE
> 
> BUT JUST SO EVERYONE IS AWARE I LIKE CHAPTER 7 AND 8.... BUT I'M REALLY EXCITED FOR YOU TO READ CHAPTERS 9 AND 10 BECAUSE THEY ARE MY MOST FAVE THINGS I HAVE EVER WRITTEN. AIGHT?


	8. Another set of vignettes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a bunch of little scenes.  
> Darcy finally gets an office.  
> Brock is on another mission  
> Brock's mom is cool.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for all the notes! yall are lovely and i am posting the rest of the fic today because i am sad and I want yall to enjoy it

The cafeteria stared at them. Brock stood with his hands on his hips and glared down at Darcy. One of her hands waved in his general direction and the other was balanced on her own cocked hip. Their voices were low but people could definitely tell there was something going on. He was the STRIKE Commander. And who was she again?

"I can't believe you." Darcy hissed angrily at him, her light eyes were slits behind her thick framed glasses.

He cocked an eyebrow, "Really? You can’t believe I would do this? The man who’s been begging you to evaluate your workplace security for three months? Really?"

"Really. Who moves their soulmate's cubicle into an office just because they can." She reached up and tapped his shoulder with the back of her hand gently.

Brock looked down at her smugly, she wanted to wipe that look off of his face, he had encroached on her territory! "I brought up the possibility of an information leak, as your coworker, to Director Hill and she authorized the move for your desk."

"You guys orchestrated this while I was with Jane." Her blue eyes narrowed further. "I knew I shouldn't have went as part of the delegation to do the interstellar negotiations between Terra and Xandar. Even though meeting Nova Prime through a communications device was fucking amazing, getting my whole workplace zen fucked with while I was gone? Not cool, dude." Darcy shook her head and swatted at his shoulder again. "I don't have anyone to enjoy gangsta rap Wednesdays with anymore, especially now that your mother has made me a playlist. Your mother would be disappointed in you, Brock.” She sighed heavily, “I do my job and this is the thanks that I get?”

"You're still on level twelve, you know that right?" He looked down exasperatedly. “Your favorite co-workers will still walk by, Midori can still find you for lunch.” He narrowed his own eyes at her and Darcy held his gaze, “And don’t you bring my mother into this.”

"Behind a locking door, I won't have anyone to talk to as they walk by." Darcy pointed even more emphatically, "You're going to pay for this."

Brock smirked. "Yeah? How exactly am I going to do that?" He caught her waving hand and held onto it. 

"I'll think of something. Or your mother will." Darcy squeezed his hand before she pulled it away. "And where the shit have you been? I've been trying to find you to be upset with you all day."

Brock took a step forward. He was in his tactical gear again. Black on black on black with loaded weapons on his hips and an unloaded rifle strapped across his back. Under his shirt, his biceps flexed as he pushed a lock of Darcy's dark hair behind an ear. "Advanced weapons training with all of the STRIKE teams." His smirk turned into an all out grin, "Didn't message you because I knew you'd be pissed with me." A long sigh left Darcy's lungs. She shook her head and glared at him as he said, "Did you get the office warming gift I left for you?

"You mean the creepy fuckin’ gnome you left peeking out at me from behind a leaf in my pothos?" She cocked a brow high. "Yeah I found him staring at me with his beady little eyes, his clay hand on his sharp stabby murder spade." Her lips sneered. "I hate gnomes."

He laughed and said, "I know, but how do you feel about your new view?"

"My view? My view?" Darcy threw her arms up and stalked out of the cafeteria, leaving him there laughing at her retreating back. The view overlooking STRIKE's outdoor training gym on level ten was not something she wanted to admit to Brock that she enjoyed.

~~

Bundled up in a thick jacket, scarf, and a cap pulled over her ears, Darcy looked up at the roof of Brock's mother's house. It was a well worn and definitely loved yellow victorian, it reminded her of the houses in Jane's mother's neighborhood in London. Darcy's eyes were as wide as Valentina's as they watched her son and Captain Fucking America string lights across the white trim. "Maybe I should always have Brock setup and tear down the Christmas decorations," Brock's mother took a sip of the steaming mug of coffee in her hands. "I knew he was going to have help, but I thought he meant that Johnny or Nicky would take the train over."

Darcy looked at the woman and then back up to the old Victorian house. "Should we call Maria and Isabella?" Darcy had never met Brock's sisters in person but she had met them over FaceTime. 

She made a noise at the back of her throat, "Those girls cancelled Sunday dinner last week." Valentina tipped her mug towards the beauty that was Captain America in snug fitting jeans, "They don't deserve this." Darcy held back a laugh. Evidently Sunday dinner was a big thing for the family left in New York, Valentina made a spread that would wow the best chef's in the city and then they all had Rosario's for dessert. "Julie made the honor roll again, though, I could text her." She sipped at the coffee again, “Sixteen is old enough for those kinds of texts, right?” Darcy laughed outright then. Brock's mom was a hellion. She might be married, but she definitely wasn't dead. She knew a nice looking man when she saw one. 

Darcy looked up between Brock and Steve’s asses and then back to Brock’s. If she had to wipe a line of drool from her lips, no one was going to tell. “I mean, I don’t really know. When I was sixteen I was writing _Mrs. Darcy Barnes_ in my notebook.” Sipping from her own cup, Darcy continued, "But, yeah, I'm not complaining about this view, that’s for sure." The women caught each other's eyes before laughing together. 

Brock must have asked Steve what they were saying because Darcy heard him call out, "Stop objectifying us, Mrs. Darcy Barnes!" 

Darcy blew him a kiss and replied, "Never, baby, never!" She watched as Steve said something to Brock and he attempted to hit Cap with a string of lights. 

Once the last reindeer was attached to the top of the Widow's Walk, Darcy watched happily as Steve and Brock made their way to the ground. In Steve's case sliding down the roof tiles and landing neatly on the ground. He brushed his thighs off and called up to Brock. "Slowin' down there, Commander!"

“You left me with all the tools!” Brock called back before he dropped a few heavy tool bags from his perch. Steve grabbed the bags as they tumbled down and smiled at the women. “Ma, don’t give him the good raviolis, he gets frozen!” Darcy watched her soulmate slide down the rungs of the tall ladder silently with her teeth biting her lip. He did make one hell of a pretty picture in distressed denim, a button up flannel, and a worn leather tool belt around his hips. 

“Joke’s on you,” his mother called, “we don’t keep frozen in the house anymore.” Brock rolled his eyes and walked over to the group of them. “Only kept frozen in the house because Florentina ate them when she was pregnant,” his mother sighed deeply, “all four times.”

Darcy felt Brock’s hand land on her shoulder, she must have pulled a disgusted face, “No one expects you to get pregnant four times and eat sixty pounds of ravioli.”

His mother turned to look at them and she smirked, the same one Darcy’s soulmate did when he was about to be a smart ass, “Speak for yourself, I love babies.”

Steve bent over his knees and laughed heartily, “You should see your face, Darcy.”

Her eyes were still wide when she said, “Sixty pounds of ravioli?” Darcy took a deep breath, “I love a good carbohydrate, but sixty pounds?”

Brock shook his head and laughed along with Steve, “That’s what you come away with? The weight of the ravioli?”

She nudged Brock’s mother playfully, “I like babies too.” Steve laughed harder as Brock sputtered in surprise.

Valentina held Brock's shoulder and added, "Your father loves to spoil his grandbabies."

Darcy watched Brock side eye his mom and mutter, "No kid needs a custom engraved rattle covered in diamonds, ma."

"Just be glad your father went to that gem show in Boston this weekend, he'd be so upset to hear you talking like that."

~~

"Agent Lewis," she answered her telephone while her fingers flew across her black keyboard. The line was silent for a few moments before she repeated herself, "Agent Lewis, can I help you?

"Jack, fuck off!" Brock's voice through the phone irately. "Shit, sorry." Darcy slowed her typing. "Hey, Darcy."

"Yes?" She questioned, her fingers were hovering over the board. The last she knew, STRIKE Alpha was climbing into a mad scientist’s lair to take back a SHIELD prototype. They were supposedly on a communications black out.

"Did you want to do Wacky Wednesday tonight?" She heard the telltale clicks of bullets being loaded into a magazine. Darcy looked to the right hand corner of her computer. It was only nine in the morning, plenty of time until Wacky Wednesday started.

"Are you even on the continent?" She slowly asked. 

"We're finishing up here, you want to meet me for Wacky Wednesday or…" The question trailed off as the pop-pop-pop of a semi automatic weapon was heard. "Yes or no? I can meet you there at seven-thirty."

"Are you sure?" Darcy held the phone with her shoulder and leaned back in her chair. Staring at her bobbleheads, she said, "I'll be at Wacky Wednesday, just like every week, need to regain all the calories I shed at aerobics."

More gunfire was heard and her soulmate said, "I'll see you there, can you order the chicken fajitas for me? Please?"

"You have some explaining to do, Rumlow." Darcy rolled her eyes before she hung up the phone. He had some serious explaining to do.

Somehow, Darcy ended up sitting with Officer Ndung'u at Wacky Wednesday. The man wasn't intimidating with his height or bulk, but it was his calm competency and aloofness that always had Darcy on high alert. She genuinely liked the man, he always had interesting questions for her and the one liners he was able to zing people with made him undercover funny, and Darcy could appreciate an undercover funny kind of man. He's holding a bright purple margarita and sipping from a twisted straw in-between telling her a story.

His accent surrounded her as she took a sip from her own watermelon-jalapeno margarita. Ndung'u was telling her a story about his early SHIELD days and how the 084's they had to deal with were twice as nasty as the ones now. "Tentacles. And zat is why I can't eat calamari any more." 

She snorted into her drink before covering her laughs. "They don't make them like that any more." Darcy smiled widely before continuing, "Do you miss the 084's?"

He shrugged his wide shoulders, "Everyone misses ze excitement of ze field, but in ze end, I'd rather come home at ze end of ze day and not worry about any unearthly hoodoo." He nodded sagely. "Nineteen eighty nine was a bad year for ze 084's."

"I heard that nothing good came from the eighties." She gave herself a pat on the back when Ndung'u laughed. Eventually they both slipped into companionable silence, Darcy sipped at her drink some more and Ndung'u seemed content to sit and enjoy the raucousness around them while waiting for her food. Someone on the other side of the bar started cheering as a soccer player (oops sorry Pepe Loco! Futbol player) head butted the ball into the net. The man cheering hangs onto a friend and they both start cheering in Spanish, singing the scoring teams chant.

On the cold patio, Darcy spied Carol sitting with a pitcher of beer and a crowd of underlings that had gained her favor. They were under a heating element and Carol had a thin Capri cigarette dangling between her fingers while telling one of her own tales… or complaining about something, nothing had spilled yet so Darcy couldn't quite tell. She continued to watch Carol smoke her cigarette until a long line of ash dangled. Just as she thought the ash would fall into the woman's tortilla basket, she flicked it to the side and stood to greet… well look at that, her soulmate. 

"Ah, he arrives!" Ndung'u said happily, putting his empty glass onto the table. "And Jack," he breathed heavily out of his nose.

Darcy laughed again. That was exactly how she felt about Jack sometimes too. "Jack's not that bad."

The older man lays a twenty on the table, "You haven't known him as long as I have." Happily he added, "But, ze wind has shifted and maybe zat young woman has spoke sense to him." He stood and brushed the wrinkles out of his slim suit. "She's going places." Ndung'u placed a shovel-like hand on her shoulder. "You both are ze future of ze agency." 

Before Darcy could reply, Ndung'u floated his way out of the restaurant and out the door. Whatever he said to Brock and Jack had Brock holding onto the building laughing, Jack looks hurt, and Carol is unimpressed with the lot of them.


	9. A swift death for Clarice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarice dies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I JUST POSTED CHAPTER 8

"You're not fixing my car." Darcy looked at him and he watched her chew a cheek. She definitely didn't look impressed with him.

"Never said anything about fixing that heap of shit." Brock copied her stance.

She raised a brow high. "And what exactly are you going to do with my car? I've had her for seventeen years." Her heel tapped on the floor. "You just think you can tow my car away, to what? Make room so your dumb ass Jeep can be parked inside at night?"

He rolled his eyes. Why was she always so difficult. Brock was trying to do something nice for her. All Darcy did was complain about the car sitting dead in her garage and how she didn't want to fix it because it wasn't worth the repairs. "Jane put her hammer through the engine block, Darcy."

"And?" She continued to tap her foot. "What does Jane learning how to wield Mjolnir have to do with this?"

"Your Civic is never going to run again." He pointed at the destroyed hood as the tow truck pulled it out of it's home. The car's red paint was peeling, a tire was flat, there wasn't even a windshield anymore (glass was buckled all the way down to the seats!), and of course, the engine was dragging on the concrete where Jane had smashed through it with Mjolnir.

"But that's my car," she gestured emphatically. She was not happy with him. Out of nowhere he had said that she was getting a new car and that Clarice was going to get a death all other cars would envy.

"Darce, you haven't driven it in two years," Brock said plainly.

She poked him in the chest again, it was one of her favorite things she did to make her point, "But it is my car."

Brock grabbed her hand, just like he always did and held it gently, "Don't you want to know where we are bringing her?"

"No, I want you to put her back in her spot." She huffed and then sniffled. 

Across the street, Mrs Silva called out, "You're finally getting rid of that hunk-a-junk?"

Darcy glared over the tow truck. It was finally pulling Clarice onto the flatbed with thick chains, the engine block barely holding on. "It's going to a good home," Brock called. 

Her little Pomeranian barked in excitement, he had never seen a tow truck before. "Good riddance, get her something sporty!" Mrs. Silva had taken a shine to Brock and had stopped nosing into Darcy's business. She still walked over on Friday with fresh bread for the weekend, but the weekly interrogation on her safety had significantly been reduced.

Darcy let out another sniffle and dramatically cried, "But Clarice!" She fell to her knees and pretended to weep heavily.

~~

Brock down shifted as he drove the Jeep through a farm gate. Darcy still wasn't impressed with him even after he attempted to convince her that Clarice was going to have an honorable death. The tow truck was in the middle of a paddock unchaining the broken vehicle as they pulled up and parked next to a bright orange Bugatti, a very practical silver Chevy Malibu, Jack's dusty Land Rover, and one rusted ass, paint peeled, gun rack equipped, brown with a line white stripe, pick up truck with it's rear plate hanging on by one screw.

Brock's tinted Jeep stood over all of them with its impractical lift kit and extra large tires. He had finally told Darcy that the Jeep had been an impulse buy after his stint as Crossbones, he wanted something to indulge in, and a frivolous vehicle had been just the thing. "She's going to go out with a bang," he said trying to reassure his soulmate.

Darcy looked over at him with red rimmed eyes and her lips set into a hard line. "I can't believe you did this to Clarice."

He pulled the key out of the ignition and leaned on the wheel. "I promise you're going to love this." 

Petulantly she replied, "Doubtful."

A knock sounded at Darcy's window and they both turned. The dark outline of Clint Barton stood there staring at them. "Get out of the Jeep, we got destroying to do!" He pressed his face against the window, "Natasha brought a grenade launcher for you, Darcy!"

Brock watched as Darcy did a slow motion turn to stare at him. "Grenade launcher?" Her eyebrows were as high as they could go, they were almost one with her hairline. Brock smirked again, her shocked expression had him holding back a laugh. If he laughed, he knew she would strike out and poke him with one of her sharp nails. 

Barton shook the side of his Jeep and begged, "Come on, we have things that go boom and we want to use them!"

Brock reached for his door first before he opened it and jumped down from the vehicle. He walked around to the boot of the Jeep and unlatched it. The door swung wide and he pulled out a large weapons case. "Did you bring the beers?" He called out to Clint.

"Beers, rags, tape, and a five gallon barrel of isopropyl." He laughed loudly. Brock peeked around the edge of the Jeep and saw Darcy hop to the ground, kicking up dust as she went. "Barnes is showing Sam how to make Molotov Cocktails."

"Molotov Cocktails?" Darcy's voice went high into another octave range. "What the fuck are we doing?"

Shutting the back of the Jeep, Brock walked to her with the heavy case and smiled, "Giving Clarice what she deserves." He held his empty hand out and waited for her to clasp his back.

"Time to do explody things, what are you waiting for, Darcy?" Clint bounded towards the group of people crouched on the other side of his beat up pick-up. 

Finally, he felt Darcy grab his hand. She pulled him towards her by his belt loops and Brock stepped into her arms. "I get to blow her up?" Her eyes had started to water again. Fuck, maybe this hadn't been a good idea. Darcy ducked her head into his chest and sobbed. "I've always wanted to throw a Moltov Cocktail." The weapons case dropped to the ground and he gathered Darcy up against him as she put herself back together. His hand smoothed her hair down her back until she pulled back. With a wicked smile, she looked up and said, "What are we standing around here for?"

Brock squeezed her waist and laughed, "Waiting on you, soulmate." 

As they walked to the group of people looking at the assorted arsenal, Brock watched Darcy pull her hair into a high ponytail. She was tightening it when Clint moved to the side and she caught sight of Jane tossing Mjolnir around in her hand. "Jane!" Darcy ignored the other people and ran full tilt to her friend and wrapped her arms around Jane. "I thought you already left for Xandar!"

Brock stood next to Jack and they nodded to one another. Jack was snapping a prototype phaser weapon together. Ndung’u heard about their plan and had insisted that they use it for 'field testing'. Looking back at the women, Jane replied, "I heard they were going to have a goodbye party and I couldn't miss it." 

"Fuck!" Darcy and Jane jumped together happily before she turned and moved the both of them to where Clint, Natasha, and her friend Midori were laying out different RPG's. Sometimes Brock forgot that Midori was a SHIELD agent, he mostly saw her climbing ladders and moving large pallets of inventory in the warehouse, but he knew that she had to have been trained in all the weaponry that she moved around the world. The personnel that work in Logistics were some of the most talented in SHIELD, they just didn't boast about it, and he liked that about them. 

Bucky Barnes stood up and dusted off his knees before reaching out a hand to shake his own. "Good to see you alive."

"Likewise, glad they got that shit out of your head." Brock shook his hand before he placed his case back down and crouched in front of it. "Glad everyone could help out with this."

Steve Rogers stood next to Bucky before he held onto his friend's shoulder, "She's saved our asses more than once, least we can do."

Behind them, Sam said, "We were able to get out of Myanmar just in time." 

"She's damn good at her job, don't know why she hates it so much," Jack clicked the last piece of the prototype into place and stood. 

"Bureaucrats," Natasha yelled. 

Brock made an affirmative hand gesture, "Red tape and shady government agencies, she just hates people spying on her to make sure she doesn't sell state secrets more so she plays the game." He unlocks the case and lays it out on the ground. He hears Barnes whistle long and low in appreciation.

"I ain't seen one of those since they thawed me for the Ivan Stambolic assassination." Barnes' eyes were wide. "Degtyarev's are fun." It had always been said that The Asset had a fine appreciation for a well built weapon while he was thawed. Brock and Jack also had kept scientists away when he would run his smart mouth, reminding them that The Asset could snap them in two. 

Personally, the shit that came out of Barnes' mouth before he was wiped, while he was undercover as HYDRA, had him holding back laughs until he was able to get back to his house and buckle over to laugh.

"Yeah, thought she'd have some fun taking a few long range shots." Brock knew his soulmate and knew that she wanted to practice with real targets past the five hundred meter range. "Were you able to mark seventeen hundred meters?"

Steve waved toward the hill to the east of them, "Top of the hill is just under. Sam was able to get some aerial topography readings."

"Like I said," Sam said pointedly, cocking a Glock, "she got us out of Myanmar just in time... so I'm happy to help."

Later, the car smoldered in the middle of the farm's field. Clarice had been pummeled with Cap's shield, zapped with the phaser, and shot at with an arsenal of handguns. The women took charge of the grenade launchers and Midori held her friend steady so Darcy could take the first shot. The top of the car had blown off and landed in a twisted heap twenty feet away. At one point, Clint helped Darcy pull back the strings of his bow to shoot an arrow that let out a spattering of buck-shot like a shotgun. Eventually, everyone had fashioned their Molotov's and with Darcy going first, she launched the fiery bottle forward to ignite the Civic's seats on fire. 

Taking in the madness, Brock leaned against the grill of Clint's busted truck while they heard the Plink-Plink of bullets hitting Clarice. Natasha stood with him and ripped a gummy worm in half before she asked, "So, you've found your soulmate and she's laying on the ground with the most prolific assassin of the twenty-first century sniping her own car, now what?"

"He's the better shot, so," Brock shrugged his crossed arms, "maybe he can teach her something I can't." 

Natasha slurped the gummy worm into her mouth and observed, "She's a hard one to keep up with, when you're not looking, she will blindside you."

Jack sidled up to them and hopped onto the hood of the truck. "Hopefully she's trying to convince him to replace that fuckin' twat Delahany."

Natasha lifted a red eyebrow and gave Brock an unimpressed look. "You still haven't desked him? Does no one listen to Carol anymore?" 

Brock shook his head, "We don't have anyone that can shoot like that, accurately enough, who is willing to go in the field now that Barton's out."

Natasha passed Jack a gummy worm, "I'll see if I can work something out," her head shook, "all Wilson and Barnes do is bicker, I’m done with it." 

His second in command waved the candy back at her, "It'd be nice to have STRIKE Delta back, too." She flicked the candy with a dusty hand as Jack continued, "Tanaka wouldn't admit it but she misses you."

Brock nodded seriously, "Less than five percent of applications for the STRIKE teams were from women this year."

"Five percent?" She whipped her head to look at them. "Five percent? Where the hell is Foxtrot?" Foxtrot was the all woman team that was sent out on specialized extraction when men might not be trusted by the evacuees. 

Sadly, Brock said, "Doesn't exist after the uprising."

“Doesn’t exist?” Natasha said slowly. Jack grabbed the bag of candy before Natasha dropped it, horrified. "I'll fix this."

They sat in silence and continued to watch as different parts of the car were deftly shot out of existence. Darcy's laugh could be heard faintly from the top of the hill while they sat and ate the bag of candy. Brock had given in somewhere between someone shooting out the fuzzy dice somehow still sitting on the edge of the dashboard and a hubcap being thrown by Steve only to get a hole shot through it.

"Is she a good enough shot?" Natasha asked Jack while nodding her head towards his girlfriend. 

"Ninety three percent up to three hundred meters." Jack leaned back on his arms and Brock looked between the two. "Her five mile is down to just over thirty two minutes."

Natasha looked impressed. Brock hadn't known her run time had improved that much. "Anything else?"

"Speaks French, Arabic, and Kiswahili." Jack sounded proud. They didn't really talk much about each others' partners, Brock realized, that might have been a miscalculation. The tragedy of Jack having to deal with the death of a HYDRA soulmate made him uncomfortable and Brock didn't know how to bring up the possibility that the woman currently poking around Sam Wilson's flight pack could be the one for Jack. He wasn't blind, he did see how they looked at one another when they thought no one was watching. "She doesn't talk about it but she took Tanaka out in three minutes fifty."

Natasha pursed her lips and nodded, "I'll fix this."

They waited until the sun was setting behind a puff of smoke from Clarice to turn in for the night. Darcy asked Steve and Jane to do the honorable thing to put her car out of its misery. With a swing of Mjolnir and a toss of his shield, Jane let the hammer pulse against Steve's shield to push the mangled remains into the ground. "This is the most fun I've ever had with my pants on," Darcy sighed as she held onto Brock's arm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was my favorite chapter to write. i really hope you enjoyed it.


	10. Christmas with the Mancini's

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One wild ride with the Mancini family.
> 
> we find out exactly why Polish Bob is Polish bob

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: there is one sentence about underage drinking in this chapter, so if that bothers you, I'm sorry, and it really isnt plot relevant so skip it. Second TW is that Brock's father uses out-of-date understanding of Autism. Brock's father is also in his late 70's. It isn't mean, but it was more of the mindset in the 70's for an "average" person. (even into the eighties)
> 
> i really hope you enjoy the madness that is Rumlow's family

One of Brock's niece's sat across from them at the dinner table and stared at her, the pink plastic fork in her small hand missed her mouth every third bite. Darcy stared back while eating her own marinara covered fish balls, or polpette do pesce al sugo (Brock, his mother, and father had rattled on in fast Italian as he served the dish around the table ). 

His family had welcomed her with open arms, all of them, all seventy something of them, they had multiplied even more since the last photo they all took together. The evening before, Christmas Eve, the whole family gathered in the house Brock grew up in. Somehow, they were all able to maneuver around one another in the old creaky Victorian home. Kids slid down wood banisters and ripped garland down as they went, babies were put down for naps in different rooms all over the house, the niece's nephews and second cousins in their teens grabbed food from the tables and locked themselves in the basement to loudly play Guitar Hero, picking up where they left off last year. The second cousins who weren't old enough for Guitar Hero and too old for naps ran around dropping food from their plates before their parents wrapped them in their coats and shoved them into the fenced backyard to play in the fresh snow. It was an absolute madhouse, Clint Barton had probably worked at circuses that weren't as rowdy as this.

Also, she was pretty sure his cousin Cara and her husband had disappeared into one of the bedrooms...alone, and came out flushed and happy.

Brock's siblings were all pleasant with her and asked all the questions one asked their brother's soulmate at their first family function. But his grandparents, they didn't hold back. At one point, his grandmother switched to quickly spoken Italian and his cousin, Mira, had to translate for Darcy. Evidently, she had almost stroked out when Brock called to tell her he had met his soulmate. After everyone, except Darcy, laughed loudly, his grandfather spoke up to say that now they could die, they had been waiting for their last grandchild to find their other half. The running joke had the family laughing harder and Brock had his arm around her shoulders, a reassuring weight in the overwhelming situation.

The next day was just his immediate family for Christmas dinner and dessert, everyone had bunked down in different rooms for the night, most of the children were handed blankets and told to sleep in the basement. Him and his brothers had climbed into the attic to pull the leaves to the old table down, the night before an arsenal of six foot fold out tables had been set up around the house. Once they set the table and found their seats, Valentina and Brock started to dish out the different courses. And that's where Darcy found herself in a staring contest with a six year old. Darcy was chewing slowly when the kid missed her mouth again.

"Estella, eat your food," Brock said around his fork.

"She staring again?" His sister, Maria, a few seats down asked. "We've told her not to do that, she stares at everyone." The woman took a long drink of wine. "Sorry, Darcy."

Darcy continued to chew her fish balls and stare at the kid, narrowing her eyes and lifting one brow high, she wasn't one to back down from a challenge. Estella stared back until she flicked her eyes over to Brock and loudly asked, "Uncle Brock, are you just try'n to find the right girl or something?"

The table went dead silent. "Estella!" Her mother exclaimed, "You don't go around asking people that."

"Why are you so rude?" Her older brother asked next.

"Hey, hey!" Brock interrupted then. Darcy choked on her fishball and Brock patted her back. "It's a good question."

"They're soulmate's," another niece said before sighing dramatically, "It's so romantic. I can't wait to find my soulmate." 

An older nephew spoke up from the other end of the table, "Yo! D'ja hear? Polish Bob Jr. found his soulmate the other day at Rosario's, can you believe that shit?" Darcy saw his father tap him upside the head. "Sorry, noni! But how crazy is that?"

Once Darcy was able to dislodge the battered fish from her throat, she looked at Brock and watched him smile down at her, hazel eyes twinkling. "Are you going to get your cake at Rosario's too?" Estella asked sweetly from across the table.

"Everyone gets their cake at Rosario's," his other sister, Isabella, spoke up, she sat a few seats down from her, "None of that D.C. hoity toity bullshit up here. Sorry noni." She pointed a marinara covered fork towards them.

Estella finally put her own fork down and sat back in her chair. She looked just like her uncle (and the rest of the family, if Darcy was honest with herself) as she mimicked him. She crossed her arms and assessed Darcy cooly. "Lemon raspberry is the best, you should get that."

A similarly aged cousin pointed a plastic fork towards Darcy, "Double chocolate is the best." All the sharp objects being pointed in her direction had Darcy holding her fork a little tighter.

The family continued to eat and argue about the best wedding cake flavor from Rosario's until Brock's father stood up on his creaky knees. He leaned his hands on the table and everyone quieted down. His dark eyes looked to every last one of them before announcing in his thick Bronx accent, "They're gettin' a Zuccotto, or not'in." Darcy's brows rose. She didn't realize that the family had already decided that the both of them were getting married and had picked the cake. Then again, the Mancini's were one of those old school families where soulmate's stuck together through thick and thin, sicker for poorer, all that jazz. Her mom had divorced three times before Darcy graduated high school, no soulmate in sight.

"You'd like a Zuccotto." Brock agreed before he draped an arm across the back of her chair, squeezing her shoulder. It looked like he had given up on eating to watch the insanity about to unfold.

Estella knocked her chair back with a squeal. "Zuccotto! Zuccotto!" She started cheering with her hands in the air. From that moment on, it turned into more of a melee, children screaming in excitement about wedding cakes and his siblings agreeing emphatically with their father. 

Darcy looked up and met Mr. Mancini's eyes (Please call me Vic...She made me take her name, family superstition, don’t ask.), he gave her a quick wink before sitting back down at the head of the table. Looking at Brock and then back over to the excited children, Darcy finally put her fork down and cleared her throat, "What's a Zuccotto?"

"Oh.my.god." Estella wheezed. "The best thing ever," she ducked under the table and reappeared next to them, dark pig tails bobbing on top of her head. She pushed her way into her Uncle Brock's lap and explained, "It's ice cream cake duh!" She shook her head and motioned her hands at Darcy, "How do you not know this."

One of the older nieces said excitedly, "It's like if a pumpkin spice latte had a baby with an ice cream cake and bathed themselves in chocolate and almonds."

"Rosario's doesn't use that fake coloring either, real alchermes." Brock's sister in law spoke up, her Boston accent sneaking in. "You wouldn't make it in this family if you were a vegan, honey." Darcy had held back commenting on Florentina’s love of Val’s ravioli tonight

Her husband, J.R., replied, "Cousin Andrea, you met her last night. Ya know, she's got that stupid diamond in her tooth, she tried to be a vegan once." His name was really Victor Junior, but no one had called him other than J.R. since the late seventies.

Estella loudly said, "Noni Noni shoved mortadella in her mouth because she was complaining about missing real Italian food."

Valentina spoke up, "She tried to bring a tofu semifreddo to Christmas that year, can you believe that? Tofu? On my table?" 

"Noni Noni tossed it out the window and it melted in the street." His oldest nephew finished and laughed heartily.

Once dinner died down, the kids once again disappeared into the basement and the adults settled around the tree with the really young children. Everyone had tiny glasses of homemade limoncello to sip and the bottle was being passed as glasses emptied. Darcy leaned against Brock's sturdy chest and he held her hip as they listened to the conversations around them. 

Somehow, Polish Bob came up in conversation and Darcy couldn't help it, she had to speak up. "Why do you call him Polish Bob?" Darcy watched Brock smirk and put back the rest of his limoncello.

"Polish Bob is one of the six Bob's," his other brother, Gino, said.

"Six Bob's?" Darcy tried to hold back a laugh.

"There's six Bob's in the neighborhood," Isabella said as she leaned over Brock's shoulder to fill his glass again. 

Maria explained, "When the street lights went on you'd hear all the momma's calling for Bob all over the neighborhood. No one knew who was supposed to go where. Forget it if someone called over here to get their son to come home and we were all playing in the yard, ma didn't know which Bob was which."

"We have Polish Bob, Bob Jr., Italian Bob, Bobby, Bobby-o, and Robbie." Brock took another sip from his cup as he explained. "Robbie was pissed when he didn't get named Italian Bob." 

"Didn't he challenge Italian Bob to a duel for the name?" Maria laughed.

"Italian Bob knocked him out with a baseball bat." Isabella said.

"Italian Bob is currently on Rikers Island, too," Valentina said, "That boy never knew when to stop."

"Brock knocked him out good a few years back," Maria drained her glass and refilled it quickly, "He was causing trouble over at Muhammad's on the corner, giving him trouble for buying the bodega."

"I might have known him for forty five years, but we don't put up with none of that racist bullshit in this neighborhood." Brock waved emphatically, "That little shit deserved it."

"But why is Polish Bob Polish Bob?" Darcy asked again. 

Isabella shook her head, "Polish Bob ate only pierogies for years."

Vic sloshed a little of his drink and clicked his fingers together, "He's got that..what do they call it now a-days? He was the weird Bob." He snapped his fingers a few more times looking for the right word. "Autism, smart as a whip though." He put some limoncello down the hatch and Darcy smiled. "As long as the food was wrapped up in dumplin' dough, that kid would eat it."

Valentina finished, "His mother would stuff pierogies with baccala, squid, potato and fennel, jam and fruit, anything and everything... he'd eat it. Never seen a kid before him or after him that ate so many different foods."

Darcy grabbed the bottle from Brock and topped her glass off, "So he's not Polish?"

"Sicilian through and through," Brock commented. 

~~

Darcy blinked her eyes open slowly and watched as a small face came into focus. Estella was laying on the floor next to their air mattress, her head was resting on her crossed arms and she kicked her feet behind her. "Are you a secret agent too?" 

Darcy blinked again. The familiar warmth of Brock was absent behind her so she didn't have any back-up. "Wahh?" Was all that Darcy could muster before she turned onto her back.

"You've got really big boobs," his niece said frankly, "I've never seen a secret agent with big boobs on the television."

"Leave her alone, Estella," a passing adult said through the open door.

Darcy turned her head and looked at the young girl, closed her eyes and pulled the blanket over her head. "Did you drink noni's limoncello? Jules says it's devil juice and that's why my Daddy can't walk after drinking it." By the end of the night, her dad hadn't been able to walk and Brock was the only one strong enough to manhandle him up the stairs. The three oldest children stood at the bottom of the stairs and watched the procedure laughing while Valentina slipped them a sip of the homemade limoncello.

Pulling the blanket down just far enough to look at her, Darcy narrowed her eyes. "Where are your parents?" The young girl shrugged her shoulders up to her ears. Darcy tried again. "Ok...where's your Uncle Brock?" She shrugged her shoulders again. "Why are you in here?" 

The little girl laughed as she shrugged one more time. "I don't know." Darcy watched as Estella ranger crawled closer to the bed. "You have really pretty eyes, blue's so pretty."

"You have pretty eyes too," Darcy said with a tired smile, "Hazel just like your Uncle Brock's."

They stared at each other for a moment until a voice called out. "What's like mine?" Brock said, poking his head into the room. He ran a towel over his wet head and draped it around his neck. "I told you not to bother her, Estella."

She looked to the door wounded, "I'm not botherin'!"

Darcy rolled to her side and looked between the two, "Evidently I can't be a secret agent because I have big boobs."

Her soulmate walked into the room, crouched and rolled his niece up and over a strong shoulder. She cried out and laughed. Darcy smiled at their antics, seeing Brock so relaxed with his family was eye opening. She knew he had plenty of feelings, he wasn't the kind of man to shy away from them, but he did hold people an arms length away. Not his family though, not even Cousin Andrea and her dumb diamond tooth. Brock ran in a circle and Estella kicked wildly in the air, "She's a better secret agent than me, young lady."

"No way," she cried, "You're the best."

"Ya way," Brock answered, "No one expects her to be a secret agent because she's so beautiful and turns every man's head."

"Put me down Uncle Brock." She laughed. He swung her down and Estella immediately jumped into the bed with Darcy. "Are you really a secret agent?"

Darcy let a secret smile pull across her lips as she answered, "I wouldn't be a very good Secret Agent if I went around telling everyone, would I?" 

The young girl sighed and wrapped her arms unexpectedly around Darcy, "You're way cooler than the last girl he brought to noni's." Her head rested on Darcy's chest and she happily said, "I want to be a secret agent like Uncle Brock someday."

*****

Looking at all of the paintings in the large Victorian, Darcy scrutinized them. She stood in front of one painting that looked familiar, as if she had seen a similar painting before. Leaning forward she looked for the signature in the corner and made out a "Vincent" in the corner. Darcy looked at it closer. It was not a print. The irises on the canvas were almost three dimensional, the paint laid on itself in layers. She continued to stare at it as the family continued to pack their belongings for their trips back home. This painting felt like the painting that hung behind Brock's desk in his office, it looked a little too good to have been painted by just anyone. 

Darcy felt the weight of the floor shift in the hallway and she looked over. Brock stood there with another small smile on his lips and their duffel bags in his hands. Standing up again, Darcy stretched her arms high over her head and commented, "There's something wrong with this painting."

He strode towards her before leaning down to kiss her on the cheek, "There's nothing wrong with that painting." 

"Is that what's wrong with it?" Darcy questioned as she narrowed her eyes at it again. It clicked just as Brock nudged his hips behind her ass and grasped her hip. "Who just has a Van Gogh just hanging in their house?"

Brock looked at her before rolling his eyes, "Why can't my ma have a Van Gogh hanging in her house, I have a Basquiat."

She rounded back on him and raised an eyebrow like it was obvious, "People just don't have Van Gogh's and…. What is that, a Picasso?" She pointed to the large framed work in the spare bedroom diagonal from them. "People just don't have Picasso's hanging in their house."

He kissed her cheek again before stating, "You missed the Dali, Matisse, and Hokusai." Darcy watched as Brock thought for a moment, "You did see the Ming and the Tiffany in the room we were in, right?"

"What do you mean?" 

"You could say that my mother also collects artwork." Brock looked a little too happy saying this. She continued to stare at him until he explained a little more, "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree here." Brock's steady hand held her waist and smiled wide, "Estella's probably going to be the one to live up to the Mancini name, that kid can swindle anyone."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just the epilogue left!


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An Epilogue to wrap everything up.
> 
> We find out exactly what happened to Delahany

Before they left the old Victorian house, his mother yelled up the stairs, "Go get her a Calder!" She didn't explain what she meant, so Darcy figured Brock must know what she was yelling about.

He ran his tongue along his teeth before he said, "She must like you," he dropped their bags and wrapped his arms around her waist. "Took her seven years after meeting Florentina before she gave a painting to her and J.R. I still don’t think Gino and Viola have one, too many people in and out of their house all the time." Brock pulled her closer and nuzzled his face in her hair and Darcy melted a little. "Or she knows you can keep a secret." 

Her hands laid on his forearms as she melted into his hold, "So you think I made a good impression?" It had been one hell of a chaotic (good) weekend.

Unwinding his arms, she felt Brock pull her by the waist. "You won over Estella, she's the one who doesn't trust a person farther than she can throw them." He nudged her towards the back of the house.

Darcy gave Brock a distrustful look as they stopped in front of a locked door. The family had been very specific about not going into this room. It had piqued her interest at the end of November, but by Christmas she had brushed it off as _one of those family things_. Brock leaned over and flipped the whole door knob up to reveal a bio-metric scanner. He let it take a scan of his hand before it unlocked and sprang forward. "Holy. Shit." Darcy walked into the center of the large room and spun in a circle. The smell of still drying paint could be smelled, even with a small exhaust fan working hard in the corner of the room. She looked at the six identical paintings sitting on easels in a line on one side. The yellow poppy flowers in a vase stood out brightly on every canvas and seemed to laugh at her. "When you say there is nothing wrong with the painting…."

Brock shrugged and smirked. "There's nothing wrong with the painting." Darcy shouldn't have been surprised, as much as she shocked him, he was always shocking her. "Do you want to see the Calders?" He moved to a rack that held canvas upon canvas in the back corner. 

"Please don't tell me these are all real." Darcy followed him to the corner and watched as he picked through the canvases. Her breath was starting to become more ragged.

"Unless you want an O'Keeffe? I'm sure she'd part with an O'Keeffe" He looked over at her and Darcy's mouth was still open in shock. 

Darcy shrugged, she was unimpressed with the feds too. "I guess not. But really, I don't know…"

He pulled out an off white canvas with some circles and lines, "Thirteen Balloons. I told her you moved into a real office." Brock nodded, "Unless you want something a little more risque? I think there's a life study in here too." He raised an eyebrow.

She looked at it as he pulled it out all of the way and held its thick frame. It wasn't bad. Maybe not something she would pick for herself, but it was something that would actually look like it belonged on her office wall. Darcy nodded once. "You're positive art theft isn't going to come after me?"

"And, art theft," his eyes rolled dramatically and waved a hand around, a gesture she now knew his whole family did when they were excited. "You don't think I can handle the nerds over in art theft if they came to knock at _my mother's_ door? The FBI?" Brock slid the move-able shelf back in place before grabbing a bubble wrap padded crate. "I'm positive."

"What if Hill finds out?" Darcy was fine with the family making reproductions on stolen works of art but being part of the crime? There was a reason she hadn't done any crimes to get fired from SHIELD, she didn't need the feebs on her tail. 

Brock side eyed her and scoffed. "You think Maria Hill would hang a fake Renoir in her office?"

Barking a laugh, Darcy wheezed, "What the hell."

He shrugged, "I was up for a promotion." Brock ran some tape around the box, "Laying burned in a hospital bed is terrible not knowing if you have a job afterwards." He tossed the tape back into its box. "Ma offered it, Maria accepted."

~~

Brock walked into SHIELD after his holiday away with Darcy and paused at the threshold of the atrium. Dressed in tac-gear next to the coffee kiosk stood Natasha and Barnes. They sipped at their drinks as they waited for his soulmate to join them, she was at the end at the condiments stations doctoring her coffee perfectly. Darcy had insisted that she had a ride into work today, but now he should have pried a little more, he figured Midori was picking her up per-usual.

He moved towards them and Barnes looked up from under his loose hair and nodded at him. "What's the occasion for the visit?"

"Hey boo," Darcy turned to give him a kiss on the cheek. 

"Maria Hill called." Barnes shrugged as if that explained everything.

Natasha smirked behind her cup, looked over at Darcy, and added, "Heard she has an Ansel Addams in her office now."

Brock shook his head as Darcy held an espresso shot out to him. He took a sip of the black nectar, "I don't know anything about that."

Darcy hip checked him and smiled, "Heard ya boy was moved to train agents in remedial weapon handling." 

"I know all about that," he put back the small cup and smirked. 

Barnes assessed him and nodded. "You know, everyone thinks you look like your mother." He pointed at Brock with his cup, "I met your father once, his work putting the _real_ Amber Room back together…it impressed a bunch of Soviets." Barnes paused for a moment and added, “I mean that in the best way possible.. It’s probably why HYDRA kept you around so long. Your father kept his mouth shut, they expected the same from you.”

~~

"Can I finally move back to Colorado?" The older woman holding her small dog with one arm and a rolled cigarillo with the other asked, "Weed laws here just don't jive with my style, Director."

Taking up most of her small loveseat, Fury nodded once, "We'll get you set up, thanks for keeping an eye on her."

"Do you think Carol will finally quit now that her mark is back and clean?" Mrs Silva took a long crackling drag.

Fury scoffed, "Carol? She'll die with the agency, who would pay her Wacky Wednesday tab if she left?"

~~

Darcy felt the rush of air in her office as her door swung open quickly. "Did you know about this?"

Midori stood there with a stack of papers in her hand. "Uh, I mean I know you applied." Brock hadn't divulged anything to her. Once the word went around that Natasha was back and training elite agents for STRIKE Foxtrot, he had been mum about all of the applicants and their status.

"Ndung'u put in a recommendation letter...I didn't even know he knew my name," she slapped the papers on Darcy's untidy desk. 

Darcy turned and leaned back in her comfortable desk chair, "That's good right?"

Her friend tapped Darcy's sleek bun and huffed, "He hasn't written a recommendation since Tanaka."

Darcy looked up at her tall friend, "So, did you make it?"

"Did I make it?" Midori started laughing so hard she held herself up with the corner of Darcy's desk. "Did I make it? I got my ass kicked by Black Widow, White Wolf, and your man and then I made it." She laughed harder, like the whole thing was a joke, "And then, they made me team leader."

~~

Bucky stared into his locker for a second. He closed the door, spun the dial, and re-opened it a moment later. The _thing_ was still in there, sparkling at him. The mauve colored enamel of the _egg_ glistened in the low light but the three portrait petals were stuffed with photos of Steve, Natasha, and (unfortunately) Sam. 

“Fuckin’ Mancini’s.” He shook his shaggy head before reaching in and closing the petals, hiding the Faberge Egg behind a pile of tactical gear. There was no doubt that the original sat in there and a replica was "found" and placed in a museum with the original photos.

~~

Delahany looked at the agents around him. It was his first week on the job and to ease him into instructing, all of his students were from the Art Theft division at the FBI, Upstairs assured him that they were all capable agents, they all just had terrible aim.

Watching the agents fumble to put a nine-millimetre together made Delahany cringe inwardly and he couldn't help but wonder what exactly he did to end up in this special level of hell.

~~

Smirking around a half smoked Capri, Carol looked at Ndung'u and asked, "Do you think they'll make it? Soulmate's in their line of work?"

"Rumlow and Lewis?" The man grabbed the cigarette and stubbed it out in the ashtray.

"Who else?" 

Ndung'u leaned back, the metal patio chair at Pepe Loco's wasn't the most comfortable thing he had ever sat in, but it definitely wasn't the worst, "Well, we made it, so, I think ze have a fightin' chance."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we have come to the end, I really hope every one of you enjoyed it and that most of the pressing plot points were wrapped up nice and neat.
> 
> it is not to be said that this 'verse is dead, most likely far from it. I love these little beans and want to squish them all.
> 
> (and i love making Brock's mom an art thief/forger on par with Neil Caffrey from White Collar... and i love that his father is a 'retired' jewel thief, his knee's just aren't what they used to be, homie just switches pieces out during appraisals. woops!)

**Author's Note:**

> Most of this fic is finished, I'll update as needed.


End file.
